The Development of Air Policy and Doctrine on the Western Front, 1914-1918

Author(s): Malcolm Cooper

Source: Aerospace Historian , SPRING/MARCH 1981, Vol. 28, No. 1 (SPRING/MARCH
1981), pp. 38-51
Published by: Air Force Historical Foundation

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/44525083

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 The Development of Air Policy and
Doctrine on the Western Front,
1914-1918 by Malcolm Cooper

38 AEROSPACE HISTORIAN

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 has simply tipped it in another direction. its infancy. Just eleven years had passed
the liveslives
THE the world's of ofapproximately Hypnotized by the subsequent development
55,000 air-
first approximately major air 55,000 war cost air- since Orville Wright first flew above the
men.1 Such a figure, while certainly rep- of military aviation, many historians sands have of Kittyhawk, North Carolina, and
resentative of dreadful waste of human life, seen the significance of the air war simplyonly five since Blérioťs monoplane crossed
was hardly of an order high enough to be of in terms of its contribution to the growth the English
of Channel. This notwithstanding,
much significance in the grim accountancy strategic bombing. This type of retrospec- it would be a mistake to consider the col-
of attrition which was war between 1914 and tive prophecy has elevated and distorted lective military mind's attitude to aviation
1918. It is, therefore, not surprising that the efforts of Trenchard's IndependentasAir being either hostile or completely unin-
historians of the First World War have Force and the Gothas of Kampfgeschwader formed. While oft-quoted pre-war utter-
tended to downplay, or even ignore, the 3 far out of the context of their time.4 ances of Haig or Foch, to the effect that
part played by the airplane. The key to the understanding of aerial flying was ' 'good sport but for the Army the
operations during the First World War is
What is strange is that much of the liter- aeroplane
to is worthless,"7 did reflect a
ature dealing with the air war itself has be found neither in the combats of the fairly common antipathy to something
followed this trend, and strengthenedmythical the fraternity of the "knights ofwhich the in 1910 or 1911 could still be consid-
misconception by concentrating on aspects air" nor in the intermittent raids on Lon- ered merely faddish, the fact remains that
of the campaign essentially extrinsic to don,the Paris, or Mannheim. The war fought by 1914 the airplane was an integral part,

The wreck of a German Zeppelin shot down over England.

albeit a very minor one, of the European

out with ever increasing intensity in the
subject. Popular books have generally
skies
dealt with the careers of the famous aces, war machines.
in over the Western Front was, as John
the process engendering a level of ver- Slessor pointed out in his 1936 study AirEach of the three powers whose armies
isimilitude hardly greater than that ofPower
the and Armies, first and foremost an were to garrison the trenches of the West-
wartime press, which, in Liddell Hart's "Army co-operation war."5 The careers ern of Front for the next four years went to
von
words, followed the exploits of their fighter Richthofen, Guynemer, and Ball, war
like with its own aviation corps, complete
heroes "with the excitement that formerlythose of their less famous comrades in the with rudimentary staff, training, and sup-
bomber squadrons, were only of relevance ply organization. Indeed in Germany, and
awaited the return of a Red Indian scalping
expedition or the news of a Test Match."2inasmuch as they contributed to and de- to a lesser extent in France, the growth of
For if the panoply of color, chivalry, veloped
and from the efforts of the opposing airaviation in the years immediately preced-
forces to bring a nascent aerial technologying the war had been concomitant with
beaux gestes conjured up is not completely
divorced from reality, it certainly makesto bear on the problem of lending tactical military interest and support.8 Yet there
support to the main armies in the field.8 It iswas still something essentially amateur
too much of a facet of the air war of prime
importance only to the propagandist.3to the study of the evolution of systems andabout official involvement in aviation.
More scholarly work, unfortunately,strategies
has to ensure this sort of coopera- Cadres of trained personnel were still very
it while denying the enemy a similar small, and awareness of the possibilities of
tion,
done little to restore the balance; rather
luxury, that the bulk of this paper is de-the airplane, while more positive than is
voted. generally thought, was rather vague. The
attitude of most of those in positions of
Opposite above: The British FE 2C.
Below: The German Fokker Eindekker. ( RAF military or political influence in Great
Museum photos). WHEN science warofofpowered
science poweredflight
broke
was out
still flight
in in was 1915 still the in Britain, France, or Germany in 1914 might

SPRING, MARCH 1981 39

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best be exemplified by the reaction of Lord The end of the war of movement in late than nuisance value. The diversion of re-
Curzon, later President of the Air Board, to1914 left the opposing air forces temporar-sources away from the front, at a time when
his first trip in an airplane: "Very in- ily without a raison d'être. Beyond the the aerial situation there was perceived to
teresting. Was that a monoplane or a bi- rudimentary notion that aircraft werebe a in some way static, however, was to
plane?"9 useful extension of the cavalry for recon- prove a recurrent theme in the following
Aerial operations in the first months of naissance purposes, there existed little years.
by
the war were restricted both by the way of military air theory. With the con-
amateurism of the participants and the spicuous exception of the world of the
limitations of their equipment. Pre-war British engineer F. W. Lanchester, who AS memorandum late as onJanuary
memorandum on could
air policy 1915, doair policy a British could staff do
exercises had proven that aircraft were published a series of articles in 1914 and little more than indulge in a purely seman-
capable of discovering enemy troop 1915 which probably had some impact on tic examination of the differences between
movements and reporting their findings to British air commanders, theory only de- "reconnaissance in the immediate front of
army commanders in time for them to take veloped in the wake of experiment and the troops," "tactical reconnaissance for
corrective action. Pre-war technology had practice.16 The need for strategic recon- armies," and "strategic reconnaissance
provided airplanes that could carry outnaissance in the grand manner of August undertaken by order of General Head-
such functions with at least limited effi- and September disappeared as the barbed quarters."19 By that time, however, a new
ciency. Neither the experience nor the wire and parapets went up. Until the means phase in the evolution of military airpower
technology existed, however, to allow air- was underway. The first systematic at-
craft to cooperate with their own artillery, tempts at artillery cooperation and photo-
bring back photographs of enemy installa- graphic reconnaissance were carried out in
tions, drop anything more than the smallest the first winter of the war.20 When the
of bombs, or interfere effectively with the British launched their offensive at Neuve
aircraft of the other side. As a result, mili- Chapelle in March 1915, the Royal Flying
tary aviation in the fall of 1914 operated Corps, certainly the smallest and arguably
almost exclusively as a strategic recon- the most backward of the major air ser-
naissance force. vices,21 was capable of offering the attack-
It is difficult to evaluate the impact of air ers a fairly comprehensive support pro-
reconnaissance on the war's first cam- gram, including the photography of the en-
paigns. Aviation enthusiasts almost cer- tire German defensive position and the
tainly claim too much in arguing that this bombing of lines of communication.22
sort of scouting saved the BEF at Möns or Throughout 1915 the opposing air forces
"directly led to the victory of the Marne."10 gradually improved their capacity for tac-
Inexperienced pilots, unfamiliar with the tical cooperation. As engines became more
territory over which they were operating, powerful, airframes more durable, and
frequently got lost. The necessity of moving wireless sets and cameras lighter, the air
aerodromes almost daily, the shortages of services were reorganized to carry out
spare parts and maintenance facilities this their new tasks. The general trend was to-
brought on, and the tendency to require air- wards the combination of the heretofore in-
crew to report personally to commanding dependent squadrons into groups, attached
generals must similarly have inhibited ef- to individual army headquarters, but
ficiency.11 Finally, conservative field Gen. Sir David Henderson. commanded by senior air officers and
commanders were not always willing to placed under the general jurisdiction of the
credit the veracity of whatever information
to supply proper tactical support became air service's own administrative organiza-
was obtained through such novel,available,and the opposing air squadrons,tion. to
seemingly undependable, means.12 use the words of the British official history, There followed a general move towards
The armies maneuvering across "frettedBel- because of their comparative thein- standardization of aircraft types within
gium and northeast France, compared so
activity."17 In the Royal Flying Corpssquadrons.
at By and large, Allied units were
aptly to dinosaurs by CorrelliBarnett,13 can there was a noticeable tendency homogeneously
least, for equipped by the end of
only have been slightly aided in theirofficers to return to duties in the field - 1915: the Germans made only limited ef-
clumsy progress by their new powers even ofthe force's commander, Maj .-Gen. Sirforts to do likewise, but this was probably
sight. A relative handful of aircraftDavid
(the Henderson, being transferred tem-due to the fact that they usually had availa-
French Aéronautique Militaire , for exam- porarily to the command of the First Divi-ble a wide selection of aircraft of roughly
ple, had a frontline establishment of 135
sion of the BEF.18 equal performance. There was also a ten-
aircraft at mobilization14) inadequately This lull, interestingly enough, also wit-
dency to limit the employment of specific
supported by replacements and hampered nessed the first attempts to bomb objec- squadrons to specific tasks. In the latter
by a limited operation radius, could not tivesbenot specifically related to the war half
at of the year, for example, the Germans
expected to affect decisively the fortunes of
the front. The Germans were the most sys-organized 14 Artillerie Flieger Abteilungen
several million armed men. Still, an tematicim- in this regard. Under the instiga-
to be used exclusively for artillery cooper-
portant first step in the wartime develop- tion of Maj. Wilhelm Siegert, the newly ap-ation purposes, thus permitting the rest of
ment of aviation had been taken. The his- pointed Air Advisor to the Obersten their two-seater force, still organized in
torian of the German Army Air Service, Heeresleitung (Army High Command), Feldflieger Abteilungen as they had started
Alex Imrie, only can be held guilty of a they formed a mobile bombing group, the war, to concentrate on other duties.28
slight exaggeration in claiming that "afterwhich they named Brieftauben Abteilung Attempts at interfering with the enemy's
the first few weeks of the war, reconnais-Ostende (Carrier Pigeon Unit Ostend) in a aerial activities originally had been a
sance by aeroplanes became the funda- colorful attempt to conceal its true purpose. matter of individual initiative. Even when
mental source of information on the be- None of these early experiments in such attacks were made official policy,
haviour of the enemy."15 strategic bombing achieved much morethey were greatly restricted by the in-

40 AEROSPACE HISTORIAN

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 The British BE-2C.

adequate means of destruction at the air-The French started to install machine- 1915 , the Germans introduced the prototype
man's disposal. Early air combats usually of the modern fighter. In the process, they
guns in the front cockpits of their Caudron,
took the form of ineffective exchanges of Breguet, and Voisin pusher aircraft in decisively changed the nature of aerial op-
pistol or carbine fire, simply because air- early 1915. The Germans, who had all but erations. Heretofore the burgeoning efforts
craft were incapable of carrying anygiven up the aerodynamically inferior of each side at assisting their ground forces
heavier form of armament efficiently. The pusher configuration befmre the war,25 had gone on all but independently of those of
first British attempt to use a machine-gun responded by developing an efficient the other. Now the maintenance of such ac-
in the air ended ignominiously when the ring-mounting for the light Parabellum tivity was dependent on the neutralization
putative interceptor failed to reach the machine-gun and fitting it to the rear of the enemy's fighter force. If this could
same altitude as its prey due to the weight cockpits of their general purpose tractor not be achieved, then efforts at Army coop-
two-seaters. (In due time this was
of its weapon. Indeed, it is reflective of the eration would be exposed to constant in-
relatively slow emergence of effective supplemented by a synchronized forward terruption and loss.
firing gun.) Similarly, while the French-
air-to-air weaponry that the first of the vul- The immediate impact of effective air-
nerable German Zeppelins to be destroyed man Roland Garros was the first to enjoy
craft armament, however, should not be
any success with a fixed machine-gun
in the air by an Allied aircraft was not actu- overestimated.
fir- The number of aircraft
ally shot down but bombed, ten months ing forward through the propeller aloft
arc,26 atitany one time was still very small
after the war began (Army airship LZ-37, was the Germans who developed an relative
effec-to the size of the three-dimensional
destroyed near Ghent on 7 June 1915 bytive a mechanical interrupter gear and battlefield.
fitted In July 1915, for example, 2nd
RNAS pilot). Until the middle of 1915 atsynchronized machine-guns toWing, single RFC, responsible for approximately
least, the major menace to airmen, apart seater tractor aircraft on a large scale.15 to 20 Atmiles of the Front between Ypres
from the unreliability of their own equip- the beginning of 1917, the British and Armentieres,
still had had an average strength
ment, was fire from the ground. less than half of their fighter squadronsof 32 serviceable
so aircraft. The Wing's
equipped, and were only starting to
In the second half of the year, all of this Commander,
intro- Lt. Col. C. J. Burke, reported
was changed by the successful combination duce two-seaters of comparable armament at the end of the month that these machines
of machine-gun, engine, and airframe.24 and It performance to German aircraft had averaged
in less than one hour of flying
service a year earlier. As late as April
is paradoxical in this regard that the initia- each per of day.27 Aerial encounters hardly
tive often seemed to come from the French that year, 15 of the 20 RFC observation could be frequent in such a situation. In-
and the successful development and utili- squadrons at the Front were still equipped deed , without radar and ground-to-air radio
zation of the idea from the Germans. The with the BE-2, a machine of pre-war communication,
design such interceptions as did
British, who were to be the most enthusias- made obsolete by the introduction occur
of thewere more or less a matter of luck.
tic pursuers of the chimera of aerial machine-gun armed fighter 20 months Yet the be-development of the aircraft as a
supremacy in the last two and a half yearsfore. weapon of war was set definitely on a new
of the war, were noticeably backward in the With the machine-gun-armed course. Fokker Its progress, however erratic, was
development of the prime instrument of Eindekker , which started appearing now atdependent
the on its ability to outfight
that quest. Front in ones and twos in July and other aircraft.
August

SPRING, MARCH 1981 41

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 September and December 1915, and 47 be- The meteoric rise and fall of the Fokker
THE justicejustice
air bebedescribed,
war, described,
entered aasperiod
it could entered now a period with tween January and April 19 1 630 - the left an indelible mark on early air strategy.
of prolonged flux, with first one side then psychological effect was dramatic. RFC For it was the experience of those first
the other holding a decided advantage. The Headquarters was forced to order thatmonths "it of serious fighting that laid the
reason was an ongoing technological im- must be laid down as a hard and fast rule groundwork for the divergent policies the
balance, brought on by rapid advances in that a machine proceeding on reconnais- three major air forces were to follow for the
airframe, engine, and armament design. sance must be escorted by at least three rest of the war. The advent of the fighter
First the Germans , then the Allies, and then other fighting machines."31 As late as raised
3 the double problem of how best to
the Germans again were to find themselves April 1916, Major-General Trenchard, the guarantee the safety and success of your
in possession of fighter aircraft of greatly Commander of the RFC in France, was own army cooperation and reconnaissance
superior performance to those in service writing home to Lieutenant-General Hen- machines while threatening those of the
across the lines. As a result, they were able derson, then Director-General of Militaryenemy. The unsuccessful attempts (of the
to overwhelm the opposing fighter forces Aeronautics, "I have cut down the work, inFrench in the first weeks of the Verdun
and attack the vulnerable army coopéra- my opinion enormously. I have dropped battle and then of the Germans in the face of

Thé British Sopwith Camel.

tion machines. Until 1917, when aviation bombing, no long distance reconnaissancesresurgent Allied airpower) to achieve this
technology in general, and fighter design in are done, and jolly few short ones, and thesethrough a system of line or barrage patrols
particular, reached a relative plateau, the are only just over the line."32 persuaded each side that an aerial form of
two-seater squadrons of one side or the By the end of the spring of 1916, however,static defense was not feasible. As
other were forced to pay an increasingly the Fokker's heyday was over. Neither ofGeneralleutnant von Hoeppner, com-
heavy price for the support the armies were the Allies had as yet developed an effectivemander of the Luftstreitkräfte (German
coming to depend upon. interrupter gear; however, each found a Army Air Service) from November 1916 to
The so-called "Fokker Scourge'' was temporary way of circumventing the the end of the war was later to write:
never as bad as either the contemporaryproblem. The French mounted a Lewis
newspapers or later-day historians por- light machine gun on the top wing of their The rapidity with which the enemy
aeroplanes can get away, their abil-
trayed it.28 The Fokker, a machine of new Nieuport scout to fire over the propel- ity quickly to change their altitude
mediocre performance which only came to ler arc. The British fell back on the pusher without interfering with their obser-
prominence through its virtual monopoly ofdesign, solving the problem of firing for- vation, the difficulty of recognizing
effective airborne armament, never ap- ward by simply moving the engine out of an enemy in the air from a distance,
peared at the front in great numbers. For the way. This was essentially a retrograde all combined to prove that this kind of
example, on 14 October 1915 the German VI step, the rear-engine, lattice tail config- aerial line patrol merely meant an
unlimited waste of strength to the
Armee, holding 50 miles of the front against uration being already close to obsoles- detriment of our own reconnaissance
the British, could only dispose of seven cence, but it was sufficient to deal with the work.33
Fokkers.29 These scattered fighter aircraftclumsy Eindekker. As the battle for Verdun
certainly made their mark. Although air fizzled out and preparations for the Allied The French, as a result, virtually gave up
casualties only increased fitfully - the drive on the Somme approached comple- the attempt to contest the control of the
Germans claimed 18 British aircraft be- tion, the pendulum of aerial superiority skies on a day to day basis, pref ering to
tween May and August 1915, 26 between swung decisively in the Allies' favor. adopt an all-out offensive on particular

42 AEROSPACE HISTORIAN

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sectors only when the ground situation so Germans hoped to keep the casualty ratioto return from missions over German ter-
directed, and at all other times to follow a in favor of their numerically inferior forcesritory. In the days when airframes were
policy which might best be described as live while occupying the attentions of enemyvery light and air speed did not greatly ex-
and let live.84 The Germans, on the other fighters who might otherwise overwhelm ceed 100 mph, this was far from being a
hand, introduced a system of flexible de- the army cooperation machines. It shouldminor concern.
fense whereby their fighter groups ranged be noted in passing that the forces of nature
freely behind their lines, attacking such assisted the Germans in maintaining this
intruding aircraft as could be taken at a sort of defense. The prevailing wind alongIF posture theinGermans
posture in the
the air, and theair, adopted
French en- and the a French defensive en-
disadvantage, and generally leaving the Western Front blew out of the West,gineered a rather erratic compromise be-
stronger formations alone. In this way thedirectly against Allied aircraft attemptingtween attack and defense, it was Britain's

The Halberstadt Fighter, Type CL2 (USAF photo).

SPRING, MARCH 1981 43

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Above: Gen. Sir Hugh Trenchard.

Right: Peter Strasser , Führer der Luftschiffe, in the Imperiai German

Navy (photo courtesy Marine-Luftschiffer-Kameradschaft).

Below: Two Fok ker D-7s.

44 AEROSPACE HISTORIAN

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Royal Flying Corps that went over to what a half of hostilities. As soon as the Allies
winter the new German Jagdstaffeln (lit-
one of its own staff publications described erally, Hunting Squadrons) continuedclosed
to the gap, something the French
as 4 'a policy of relentless and incessant of- achieved in the winter of 1916-1917 and the
maul the RFC's Army, or fighting squad-
fensive."35 This policy, implemented in rons , most of which were still equipped with
British late the next spring, the struggle for
mid-1916 by Maj .-Gen. Hugh Trenchard, the aircraf tused to overcome the Fokker. It qualitative superiority was effectively
commander of the RFC in France, saw the was probably only the inability of the Ger-over. From that point on, neither side's air-
British taking the war to the enemy far be- mans to produce enough of the new Alba-craft were capable of outperforming the
hind his lines regardless of loss, or, for the tros and Halberstadt scouts which pre- other's to the extent that they were able to
most part, of changes in the technological vented them from driving the vulnerable overwhelm his fighters and seriously
or strategic balance. aircraft of the Corps, or army cooperation, interfere with his army cooperation
Trenchard found justification for such a squadrons from the sky. machines. After the middle 1917, with a few
strategy in the above-mentioned failure of The "killing time" of the German fighter brief exceptions when the balance was
rigid defensive measures and in the success service entered its final, most successful temporarily upset by the confusion atten-
enjoyed by the French in pursuing an of- phase in April 1917. In that month, the Allies dant to the commencement of a major
fensive air policy in the latter stages of the launched their twin offensives at Arras on ground offensive, the rival fighter services
Battle of Verdun.38 The reasoning behind the British Front, and east and west of actually tended to cancel each other out,
what rapidly became an institutionaliza- Rheims on the French. The Germans, cor- leaving the two-seater squadrons to get on
tion of offensive spirit, however, was basi- rectly divining that the French attack was with their business free from major dis-
cally moral. To understand this it is the major blow, moved the larger part of ruption or heavy loss.45
perhaps best to refer to that imposing their air force to the Aisne and Champagne This need not necessarily have been the
monument to Trenchard 's all-pervading sectors to meet the threat. The aircraft left case, for if the qualitative balance had been
influence over British air policy, the six- to defend the airspace of the VI Armée fac-set, simple arithmetic dictated that the
volume The War in the Air, the British offi- ing the British at Arras were out-numberedquanitative superiority of the Allies should
cial history of the air war.37 465 to 195. 41 The eight Jagdstaffeln in thesteadily increase. By the end of the war, in
sector, operating at approximately half fact, Allied aircraft on the Western Front
Aeroplanes cannot be distributed strength, could only muster a force of 50 tooutnumbered their German opponents al-
like policemen across the face of the 60 fighters. Notwithstanding this pro-most three to one.46 It would seem logical to
earth. The air service must carry the
nounced numerical inferiority, German assume that even if such a preponderance
war into enemy territory and keep it
there. The air war becomes a test of forces on this one sector claimed 206 Britishin strength did not result in the weaker side
nervous endurance. The nation aircraft for the loss of 30 of their own in thebeing swept away by weight of numbers, it
which keeps a stiff upper lip,six week period between 31 March and 11
and would certainly lead to its defeat through a
whose air service adheres to its de- May.42 process of attrition. That this did not prove
termined offensive, of course will, in One particularly significant feature of to be so can only be explained with refer-
the end, secure the greatest measure ence to the competing strategies involved.
British losses during this time was the high
of protection from the air for all its
various activities.38 percentage of Corps machines among the The flexible defense system employed by
victims. In May, June, and July 1917, when the Germans placed them at a distinct ad-
The different air policies of the combat- the British closed the technological gap and vantage in the aerial war of attrition.
ants will be evaluated in due course. It is when the rival fighter services could be Fighting almost exclusively over their own
first necessary, however, to follow the di-
considered equal, Corps machines made up territory, the Jagdstaffeln were seldom
rection of the war to the end of the period onlyof18 percent of total British losses on the brought to battle except on terms of their
technological imbalance. Western Front. In April 1917, they com- own choosing. The German pilot whose en-
The summer of 1916 saw the Allies in al- prised 41 percent of the total.43 Unable even gine was disabled, or whose machine-guns
most total control of the skies. The Ger- to defend themselves, the obsolete British jammed, was usually back in the air in a
mans, still dependent on the obsolete Fok- fighters could do little to safeguard the air- matter of hours, whereas his Allied coun-
ker and upon a system of static defense, craft whose protection was their prime
reached the nadir of their fortunes in the reason for existing.
first month of the Somme offensive. So in- Of similar importance was the cumula-
effective were their attempts at tacticaltive effect of these heavy losses on the
cooperation that they were forced to use levels of training and experience among
their bomber units, now less colorfully British pilots. These declined steadily
named Kampfgeschwadern (Battle through the winter of 1916-1917. By the
Groups) , for general protection and patrol spring of 1917 a new pilot reporting to
duties.39 Later, they normalized thisfrontline ar- squadrons had on an average only
rangement by reorganizing some of these 17 V2 hours of flying experience, two thirds
formations into Schutzstaffeln (Protection of it solo.44 His usually victorious German
Squadrons) . opponent could generally measure his ex-
The situation changed dramatically in perience in months or even years.
September as the Germans introduced a "Bloody April" marked the end of the
new generation of fighter aircraft and re- period of imbalance. With the Albatros
structured their air force to allow the adop- scout, a two-gun fighter with a maximum
tion of more effective means of defense. speed approaching 110 mph, capable of
The British were soon paying a heavy price operating at heights close to 20,000 feet, the
for their failure to keep up with recent Germansim- set a standard in fighter design
provements in aviation technology - Ger- which was to hold up for the rest of the war.
man victories in September almost Although performance did increase gradu-
equalled the combined total for the previ- ally, the technology of aviation experienced
ous three months.40 Throughout the fall no andmajor improvements in the last year and Brig. Gen. William Mitchell (USAF photo).

SPRING, MARCH 1981 45

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 terpart would be on his way to a prisoner-
of-war camp. The cumulative saving in
trained personnel became even more sig-
nificant in the second half of 1918 when the
Luftstreitkräfte, alone among the major
air services, introduced parachutes on a
large scale for its aircrews.47 Thus the
Germans were able to maintain a large
cadre of experienced, well trained flying
personnel, while their enemies, continually
weakened by higher levels of attrition,
were not.
In more general terms, the fact that the
Germans did not feel themselves obliged to
maintain an authoritative air presence
simultaneously on all sectors of the front
allowed them to ameliorate the effects of
their numerical inferiority. By denuding
quiet areas of all but the essential
minimum of aircraft, they generally man-
aged to confront the Allies in the air over
the crucial sectors on terms of near equal-
ity. On 31 July 1917, for example, when the
great British offensive in Flanders got
underway, the Germans had 21 of the 37
Jagdstaffeln available on the Western

Below: The De Havilland DH-9.

The FE 2C biplane from above, taken by another machine ( USAF photo).

46 AEROSPACE HISTORIAN

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Front stationed with the IV Armée , be- piled, accepted them at face value) theyfensive Patrols flown by the Royal Flying
tween La Bassee and the sea ; the VI Armée would seem to be indicative of a gross Corps and its successor the Royal Air Force
and the II Armée , holding the rest of the strategical miscalculation.51 threatened no vital German interests and
British sector, were supported by only General Trenchard's offensive policy therefore could be dealt with as the Ger-
three and one Jagdstaffeln , respectively.48 had been developed at the stage of the war mans saw fit. As a result, these "battering
In some instances, such as the opening of when air fighting was still in its infancy. ram tactics"54 exposed British air strength
the German Somme offensive of March While it proved sufficient to deal with small to heavy attrition while giving the enemy
1918, the Luftstreitkräfte actually found numbers of makeshift fighting aircraft the chance to minimize his losses. Indeed,
itself enjoying a local superiority in operating num- independent of any coherent tac- as was noted by L.E.O. Charlton, comman-
bers. tical system, it was costly and ineffective der of V Brigade, RAF, during the crucial
As Slessor pointed out in Air Power and when set against the well equipped and well Somme battles of 1918, and one of the few
Armies by comparing German aerial prep- organized service the German air force had senior air officers to disagree with Tren-
arations for the March 1918 offensive with become by 1917. Like Haig's infantrymen, chard's ideas,55 the over-systematization of
British preparations for the attack at committed to the costly and unproductive the offensive policy gave the Germans the
Amiens in August of the same year, the policy of constant domination of "No Man's advantages of tactical initiative and
Germans simply paid more attention to theLand," British airmen were expected to superior pilot experience as well.
essential dictum of concentration of force. substitute an essentially amateur aggres-
In the first instance, the Germans deployedsiveness for the less heroic, but equally less . . . the main reason why this of-
482 of 842 available fighting aircraft, or 57wasteful, professionalism usually dis- fensive policy was a stubborn
percent of the total force; in the second, theplayed by their opponents. stupidity is inherent in the difference
British (who it should be remembered were In short, although Trenchard's initial which exists between a planned at-
tack on a well defined objective and a
operating on a front roughly half as long asassumption "that an aeroplane is an offen- "nosing about" on the look-out for
the Germans) used only 654 of 1,390 fightingsive and not a defensive weapon"52 was not trouble. Once assured that we were to
machines -47 percent of their total.49 Thenecessarily false, his translation of this be found throughout all the hours of
German air service, while maintaining a idea into an inflexible strategical system daylight trespassing over their side
significantly lower casualty rate than itsreflected an overly dogmatic interpreta- of the line, the Germans were not
tion of the nature of offensive warfare. Air slow to devise means for turning the
opponents, was in fact getting more situation to their advan-
strategical mileage out of its frontline Vice-Marshal Arthur Gould Lee, who tage. . . . they became the aggr
squadrons. served his aerial apprenticeship on the sors in air of their own choosing
Western Front in 1917, later commented: tain that we would come along,
always waiting for us a little hi
EVEN havehave
a saved Fabian
saved the the
strategyGerman
German wouldair
air force
force not General Trenchard was right to up. Their lesser casualties . . . en
from eventual annhilation if the Allies had sustain an offensive spirit. Where he bled them to maintain a high s
erred was in identifying this with an dard of pilotage. By this means
taken proper advantage of their numbers. offensive strategy which was, in ef- created large flying formations
In a sense, however, the policies pursued by fect, a territorial offensive. To him, picked crews, and literally swept
the French and the British played into the as to his staff, and most of his senior skies along our front from end to
German hands. The French attitude of live commanders, for a British aeroplane the toll of our casualties mount
to be one mile across the trenches higher and higher as time went o
and let live simply allowed the Germans to
was offensive; for it to be ten miles
confront them with a disproportionatelyover was more offensive. ... In the
small fraction of their total strength. When Although the major protagonists
air fighting of World War I, despite
the Aéronautique Militaire did attempt tothe siege-like situation on the ground, to their respective air strategies
mount a challenge for control of the skies, it was not a fighter aeroplane's posi- balance of the war, the last twelv
as it did in support of it's army attacks at tion in relation to a line of defences did witness one major innovation
Verdun in August 1917 and at various points that measured the offensive spirit military use of aircraft. Hitherto
on the Front in late 1918, or in response to but the aggressive will of its occu- had supported their armies indir
pants to attack the enemy whereever means of artillery observation, recon-
the major German offensives on the Che-he was encountered, at whatever
min des Dames and the Marne in May andodds.53 naissance, and the bombing of lines of
July 1918, it found itself confronted by a communication. The use of aircraft for di-
temporary concentration of German avia- The disproportionate losses which the rect tactical support in the form of bomb
tion - the Germans in these instances offensive policy forced on the attackers and machine-gun attacks on the enemy's
adding to their usual advantages a superior gave the defenders a valuable advantage infrontline installations had been limited and
experience of heavy air fighting gained on terms of expertise. While the Germans generally bereft of central direction.
the more active British front. built up and maintained a cadre of veteranCommencing with the British attack at
British air strategy was, if anything, less pilots, the British found themselves caughtCambrai in November 1917, the systematic
effective. For if the French did not force the in a spiral of heavy casualties and in- use of aircraft either to help break through
Germans to incur unacceptable casualties, adequate training. The high rate of attritiondefensive positions or to hold up a victori-
at least they avoided such casualties forced the RFC to send pilots to the front ous advance became more and more com-

themselves. Not so the British. Figures before they were properly trained. There mon. In the great offensives of 1918, close
compiled after the war by the Reichsarchiv they frequently fell victim to more experi-aerial support of this nature was an im-
show a staggering disparity in losses on the enced opponents before they could find portant part of the tactical repertoire of
Anglo-German front. In 1917 the Germans their feet. This forced the casualty rate both sides.
claimed the destruction of 1,811 British air- higher still, thus further reducing the Indeed the major technological and or-
craft for the loss of 296 of their own. In 1918 length of the training period. ganizational changes introduced by the
they claimed 2 ,508 for the loss of 662 . 50 Even The worst failing of the offensive policy,rival air services in 1918 would seem to in-
accounting for some exaggeration (and it ishowever, was simply that it did not forcedicate that ground attack was widely con-
interesting to note that the British official the enemy to accept battle when he was notsidered to be the wave of the future. Spe-
historian, for whom the figures were com-prepared to do so. The Long Distance Of-cially armored aircraft and light two-

SPRING, MARCH 1981 47

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 The De Havilland DH-4.

seaters very much along the lines of later- of the war. The partial return to mobilethe last eight months of the conflict put an
day fighter-bombers appeared in everwarfare in- brought on by the successful of- enormous strain on all of the air forces. The
creasing numbers. The Germans reformed fensives of 1918, and the limited anti- RAF alone struck off 1,302 aircraft from its
all of their Protection Squadrons aircraft protection afforded the infantry- establishment between 21 March and 29
(Schutzstaffeln) as Battle Squadrons man of the day, combined to make even April 1918 (its total strength at the begin-
(Schlachtstaffeln) to be used exclusively lightly armed aircraft such as the Sopwith ning of this period was only 1 ,232 aircraft) .61
for ground attack. The British placed some Camel or the Halberstadt CLII effective in Even when growing American strength
of their fighter squadrons on low-level workthe low-level role. On 26 March 1918, for made their numerical superiority greater
almost permanently, during the Amiens example, the large numbers of British air- than ever before, the Allies were unable to
craft employed on such duties were suc-
offensive going so far as to assign all of the drive their opponents from the sky.62 Right
fighters of the supporting V Brigade to suchcessful in temporarily "freezing up" the up to the Armistice, the Luftstreitkräfte
duties.57 Finally, the French reorganized German
a advance during the crucial phase maintained its organization, strength, and
of the Fifth Army's retreat.59 Such opera-
portion of their air force into a large tacti- morale intact. Despite increasingly severe
cal support group, the Division Aérienne, tions as this resulted in some of the heaviest shortages of materiel, brought on by the
and moved it about from battlefield to losses of the war, and thus in a noticeableslow breakdown of the German war
battlefield as the situation dictated. As decline in efficiency in the more heavilyeconomy, the Jagdstaffeln continued to
most of the serious fighting on the southernengaged units. One such formation, No. 80outclass opposing fighter squadrons and
half of the Western Front in the last three Sqdn., RAF, engaged almost exclusively in the Flieg er Abteilungen to provide their
months of the war took place on the Ameri- ground attack duties for the last year of theretreating armies with vital tactical sup-
cal sector, this formidable air group, com- war, had a monthly casualty rate of 75 per-port. In the air at least, the Allies could not
posed of over 700 attack aircraft,58 wascent.60 Such loss notwithstanding, it waslegitimately claim a victory when the guns
through this sort of close tactical supportfinally fell silent.
often at the disposal of the Chief of the Air
Service of the American First Army, Col. that the aircraft was most effectively con-
William Mitchell. It was this experience of tributing to the prosecution of hostilities in
command that set Mitchell on his course as 1918. BEFORE ment
ment of airattempting
operations air operations
during the a final during assess- the
one of the most vociferous of the inter-war The war of attrition in the air intensified Great War, it is first necessary to make a
advocates of airpower. through 1917 and 1918 as the combatant airfew comments on the growth of grand
There can be little doubt that the use of services grew stronger and battles betweenstrategic bombing. That these should ap-
airpower for ground attack purposes large formations of aircraft more common. pear in the form of a postscript is fitting -
played an important part in the final battlesThe almost non-stop offensive warfare of for as was mentioned at the outset,

48 AEROSPACE HISTORIAN

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 The German Gotha bomber of WWI.

strategic bombing was very much an England.66 ad- When losses became too high fensive policy still being followed by the
dendum to the first major air war. Such and the situation in France started to de- main branch of the service soaked up ev-
operations as were undertaken were either terioriate, the German High Command erything the British aircraft industry could
launched by way of retaliation or devised as up this strategic dabbling with no ap-
gave produce, and although some of the frontline
experimental means of utilizing surplusparent air show of regret (the last raid on Lon- squadrons were forced to operate under-
strength. Although much of the familiar don took place on the night of 20-21 May strength, the IAF never deployed more
rhetoric of the airpower disciple made1918). its than half a dozen squadrons.67 Even this
first appearance between 1914 and 1918, Even the British effort was neither sus- small force cannot be considered an unre-
both the means and the practical experi- tained nor impressive. In late 1916 the served commitment to the doctrine of
ence were all but non-existent when peace Royal Naval Air Service, which had built up grand-strategic airpower: so unconvinced
returned. Fregattenkapitän Peter Stras- a surplus of aircraft as a result of a pro- of the idea's efficacy was the force's com-
ser, Commander of the German naval curement air- rivalry with the Royal Flying mander, General Trenchard, that he di-
ship service, was a lonely exception in Corps, the set up a bombing wing in France and verted more than a third of its effort to raids
field of strategic bombing. The fiery end started
he an intermittent campaign against on German aerodromes.68 Indeed, a com-
and most of his Zeppelin crews met was the the German factories within range. The ment of this most successful of latter-day
inevitable fate awaiting those who, wing like was disbanded in the spring of 1917 advocates of strategic bombing (he did not
Icarus in legend, failed to rationalize their due to Army protests that the equipment embrace the idea until after his reappoint-
visions with the fragile instruments at their was needed at the Front. In June 1918, a new ment as Chief of Air Staff in the post-war
disposal.63 bombing unit, portentiously named the In- era) might fairly be taken as the last word
For the French, strategic bombing was dependent Air Force, was set up, primarily on the doctrine's importance during the
primarily a matter of retaliation. Aircraft in response to political pressure for retali- First World War. On 18 August 1918 he
usually assigned to raids on such installa- ation for the efforts of Bombengeschwader wrote in his diary:
tions as aerodromes and supply dumps 3. The immediate military reaction of this
were occasionally sent off to attack cities in attempt at establishing a separate I am certain the damage done both
to buildings and personnel is very
southwest Germany.64 The German raids strategic bombing force was an interesting
small compared to any other form of
which touched off these attacks themselves precursor of the post-war debate on the fu-
war and the energy expended. The
had seldom been inspired by broad ture of the RAF. An undignified squabble moral effect is great - very great -
strategic concerns. The major Germanover control of the force went on throughout
but it gets less as the little material
bombing effort always was directed effect is seen. The chief moral effect
1918, while most of the army and air force
against the communication and supply command tried their best to have it dis- is apparently to give the newspapers
banded. copy to say how wonderful we are,
networks spreading back from the front. although it does not really affect the
Only one-quarter of the Luftstreitkräfte The Independent Air Force, much enemy as much as it affects our own
main bomber force was ever involved in the heralded retrospectively as the hope of thepeople.69
famous Gotha raids on London,65 and even future, achieved little during its short and
this one unit (Kampfgeschwader 3, re- troubled lifetime. Like its predecesor, itAir strategy on the Western Front during
named Bombengeschwader 3 in October was supposed to draw from a pool of air- the First World War grew up around the
1917) was often assigned other tasks. In thecraft surplus to the requirements of theaircraft's expanding capacity to assist the
space of a year, only 413 missions wereforce at the Front, and it, too, was crippledmain forces on the ground. All of the im-
flown by German bomber pilots against when the surplus proved illusory. The of- portant developments were directly re-

SPRING, MARCH 1981 49

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lated to the air services' prime function as 22. Jones, The War in the Air, Vol. II,
1973). Another recent book, studying the
90-91.
subject in a wider context, is Barry D. Pow-
an army cooperation force and to the need
to interfere with the enemy's tactical sup- ers, Strategy Without Slide-Rule. British23. Imrie, Pictorial History of the Ger-
Air Strategy 1914-1939 (London, 1976). man The Army Air Service, 29.
port aircraft while preventing him from most balanced account of the German air- 24. On the development of aircraft en-
interfering with one's own . The air war thus craft raids on Great Britain is Raymondgines H. see Robert Schlaiffer and S. D. Heron,
can be divided into five phases, the last two Fredette, The Sky on Fire. The First Battle The Development of Aircraft Engines and
overlapping to a considerable extent! of Britain 1917-1918 and the Birth of the Fuels (Boston, 1950), and Ronald Pearson,
Royal Air Free (New York, 1966). "Aero Engines of the First World War" in
1 . In the first weeks of the war the 5. J. C. Slessor, Air Power and Armies The Royal Air Force Quarterly, 12, 3 (Au-
aircraft's role was. primarily (London, 1936), 1. tumn 1972), 199-201.
strategic reconnaissance. 6. Two good studies of the development 25. The only armed pusher aircraft of the
2. From the first winter of the war
of aviation during the war years are Haroldtraditional lattice-tailed configuration to
until late 1915 the rapidly expanding Penrose, British Aviation, the Great Warsee active service with the German air ser-
air services concentrated on de- and Armistice 1915-1919 (London, 1969), vice was the Ago CI. Only 22 of this type
veloping the necessary equipment and P. Gray and 0. Thetford, German Air- were at the Front at the time of its
and techniques to support trench craft of the First World War , 2nd ed. (Lon- maximum deployment in February 1916.
warfare by means of such servicesdon. as 1970). 26. Garros fitted protective armored
artillery observation and photo- 7. Foch quoted in Liddell Hart, History of wedges to his propeller blades. He and his
graphic reconnaissance. the First World War. 355. Sir Frederick aircraft fell into German hands on 19 April
3. The subsequent introduction Sykes, of From Many Angles. An Autobiog- 1915, prompting the Germans to develop the
the fighter heralded a period of ap- raphy (London, 1942), 105, quoted Haig's more effective mechanical interrupter
proximately a year and a half when pre-war remark to some of his officers: gear. "I
first one side and then the other was hope none of you gentlemen is so foolish as 27. Public Record Office, AIR 1, 920/
able to utilize a pronounced to think that aeroplanes will be able to204/5/884.
be
technological superiority to disrupt usefully employed for reconnaissance pur- 28. The Fokker actually caused a fair
successfully the other's operations. poses in war." size political scandal in Britain with ac-
4. After the spring of 1917 this im-8. John Howard Morrow, Jr., Building cusations that British pilots were being
balance evened out and a war of at- German Airpower, 1909-1914 (Knoxville, "murdered" by government bungling. The
trition commenced which saw the 1976), 47//. Joint War Air Committee chaired by Lord
Allies' numerical advantage squan- 9. Curzon quoted in Guy Livingston, Hot Derby, the first of a series of political
dered through faulty strategy. Air in Cold Blood (London, 1933), 45. bodies called into being to attempt to
5. In the last year of the war, the 10. Sykes, From Many Angles, 138. rationalize British air policy, was a product
process of attrition was accelerated 11. See, for example, ibid., 122-144. of this controversy.
as each side concentrated more and
12. Sir John Salmond, Draft Autobiog- 29. Imrie, German Fighter Units, 1914-
more on low level attacks on frontline
raphy, 152, in RAF Archives, SalmondMay 1917 (London, 1978), 8.
positions. Papers, AC71/14. 30. Public Record Office, AIR 1, 9/15/
13. Correlli Barnett, The Swordbearers. 1/10.
Behind all of this, the development of Studies in Supreme Command in the First 31. As quoted in Jones, The War in the
strategic bombing was played out very er- World War (London, 1963), 77. Air , Vol. II, p. 156.
ratically in a minor key. Only in the most 14 . André van Haute, Pictorial History of 32. Trenchard to Henderson, 3 Apr. 1916,
general sense could the ground work for the the French Air Force, Vol. 1, 1909-1940 in RAF Archives, Trenchard Papers,
(London, 1974), 137. MFC76/1/76.
fire raids of 1944-1945 be said to have been
set down between 1914 and 1918. In this re-
15. Alex Imrie, Pictorial History of the 33. von Hoeppner quoted in Jones, The
German Army Air Service (London, 1971), War in the Air, Vol. II, 167.
gard there seems something symbolic in25. 34. The best indication of this can be
the destruction of most of Europe's air- 16. Lanchester's articles were published found in the records of opposing German
power potential in the bonfires of post-war in book form in 1916 with an introduction air units. The Bavarian fighter unit,
demobilization and disarmament. The written by (then) Maj .-Gen. Sir David Hen- Jagdstaffel 23b had four pilots killed and
derson, Director General of Military two wounded during its stay on the French
inter-war development of strategic bomb- Front (17 Nov. 1916 to 4 Feb. 1918). On the
Aeronautics. See F. W. Lanchester, Air-
ing policy was not directly related to the
craft in Warfare. The Dawn of the Fourth British Front, Jasta 23b lost nine pilots kil-
mainstream of First World War air
Arm (London, 1916). For Lanchester's in- led, nine wounded, and two taken prisoner
strategy. It is interesting to note with fluence on British air thought, see Robin of war (4 Feb. 1918 to 11 Nov. 1918).
refer-
ence to this that the most battleworthy Higham,air The Military Intellectuals in Bri- 35. As quoted in Maurice Baring, Flying
force in Europe in 1939 was Germany's tain: 1918-1939 (New Brunswick, NJ, 1966), Corps Headquarters (London, 1968).
Luftwaffe , a force designed not for
126-129. 36. Jones, The War in the Air , Vol. II,
17. H.A.Jones, The War in the Air. Being 164-165.
strategic bombing but for tactical support
the Story of the Part Played in the Great 37. The British official history was pub-
of the army in the mold of air services ofWar by the Royal Air Force, Vol. VI (Ox- lished in six volumes between 1922 and 1937.
1918. ford, 1937), 552. It has since been treated as the authorita-
18. Henderson only stayed with the in- tive analysis of the first air war, despite the
References fantry for a month. Some of these and later fact that it is badly biased in favor of
1. Robin Higham, Air Power. A Concise transfers, however, never returned. Maj. Trenchard and the policies he favored. See
History (London, 1972), 29. B. H. Barrington-Kennet, the first adjutant Higham, The Military Intellectuals in Bri-
2. B. H. Liddell Hart, History of the of the RFC and Col. C. J. Burke, first CO of tain: 1918-1939 , 119-158.
First
World War (London, 1972), 357. No. 2 Sqdn., RFC, were two notable early 38. Jones, The War in the Air, Vol. II, 165.
3. Among the better books of this sort, members of the force later killed while 29. Imrie, Pictorial History of the Ger-
although neither is completely free from serving with their old regiments. man Air Service, 33.
error, are Quentin Reynolds, They Fought 19. Quoted in entirety in Sykes, From 40. Public Record Office, AIR 1, 9/15/
for the Sky (London, 1958), and Alexander Many Angles , 525-526. 1/10.
McKee, The Friendless Sky (New York, 20. For a personal account of the de- 41. Jones, The War in the Air, Vol. Ill,
1964). velopment of British aerial photography 334.
4. The best treatment of the British see J.T.C. Moore-Brabazon, The Brabazon 42. Public Record Office, AIR 1, 9/15/
strategic bombing effort is Neville Jones, Story (London, 1956). 1/22.
The Origins of Strategic Bombing. A study 21. The RFC only had eight squadrons 43. Figures compiled from monthly lists
of the Development of British Air Strategic (one in the process of forming) and 85 of British aircraft losses on the Western
Thought and Practice up to 1918 (London, airplanes at the Front in March 1915. Front published in The Cross & Cockade

50 AEROSPACE HISTORIAN

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Journal (Great Britain) between 1973 and Acknowledgements
1978. The author is grateful to Professor
44. Jones, The Origins of Strategic Michael Howard of All Souls College, Ox-
Bombing , 170.
ford, and his Strategic Studies Seminar for
45. Arthur Gould Lee, No Parachute. A
Figher Pilot in World War 1. (New York, their helpful comments on an earlier ver-
1968,7. sion of this essay, presented as a seminar
46. The approximate strengths of the paper on 14 February 1979. He is also
major air forces at the Armistice were: grateful for the extensive criticisms and
French, 3,000; German and British each, suggestions so kindly given him by Dr.
2 ,000 . The Americans already had about 500
Robin Higham of Kansas State University,
aircraft at the front, most of them of French
design and manufacture. editor of Aerospace Historian.
47. H . Montgomery Hyde, British Air
Policy Between the Wars (London, 1976),
221, is incorrect in asserting that only a few
German airmen were so equipped. Photo-
graphs taken of groups of German fighter
pilots in late 1918 would seem to indicate
that they were in almost universal use in
the Jagdstaffeln at that time.
48. Public Record Office, AIR 1, 682/
21/13/2218.
Ttfl^Hrie
Silver light-
49. Slessor, Air Power and Armies , 184.
50. Public Record Office, AIR 1, 9/15/ blue-s^^^pK^H
1/10. 100%
51 . For the simple reason that most of the Force
air fighting took place over their own ter-
ritory, allowing them to count up the Historļ^^^^Jļfor
wrecks left by a day's air fighting, German
figures for comparative casualties were by
lowshl^^^^^^KnAhips.
far the most accurate.
52. As quoted in Baring, Flying Corps
Send $12.50,
Headquarters , 178.
53. Lee, No Parachute , 217.
54. Sykes, From Many Angles, 220. aeroIK^^^B
55. Charlton was eventually forced to Eisenho^^^^^r
resign from the RAF (after the war) be- Manhattan^^66
cause of his disagreement with official
thinking. Malcolm Cooper was born in
56. L.E.O. Charlton, War from the Air. Glasgow, Scotland, in 1954. He
Past, Present, Future (London 1935) , 56-57. holds a B.A. with 1st Class Hon-
57. Slessor, Air Power and Armies, 153. ors in History from Dalhousie
58. Van Haute, Pictorial History of the University and a M.A. in History
French Air Force, Vol. 1, 66. from the University of Western
59. Public Record Office, AIR 1, 475/ Ontario. At present he is writing
15/312/201. his Ph.D. thesis on British air
60. Slessor, Air Power and Armies, 100. policy during the First World
61. Jones, The War in the Air, Vol. IV, War at St. Antony's College,
402. Oxford University. He held a
62. In fact, the American air service low- Canadian Department of Na-
ered the average quality of Allied aircrews tional Defence Scholarship for
even farther. Built up from inadequate 1979-1980.
cadres of experienced personnel, Ameri-
can squadrons suffered heavily at the
hands of the German units flying against
them during the Marne, St. Mihiel, and Ar-
gonne Offensives.
63. The authoritative work on the Ger-
man Naval Zeppelin service is Douglas H.
Robinson, The Zeppelin in Combat. A His-
tory of the German Naval Airship Division,
1912-1918, (London, 1962) . For the history of
Britain's experience with rigid airships see
Robin Higham, The British Rigid Airship,
1908-1931 : A Study in Weapons Policy (Lon-
THE 1,000 DAY BATTLE
don, 1961).
By James Hoseason
64. Higham, Air Power, 48. A compelling account of the operations of the 8th Air
65. For most of the period of the air raids Force's 2nd Air Division, flying fourteen B-24 bomber
groups and five fighter groups from England's East
Bombengeschwader 3 consisted of 6 of Anglia 1942-1945. This is a book which breaks new
Germany's 24 available Bombenstaffeln. ground in many ways; in the detail or its narrative; in the
profusion of original photos, maps, charts and tables; in
66. Fredette, The Sky on Fire, 263-266. the emphasis on the B-24 rather than on the much
67. Jones, The War in the Air, Vol. VI, publicised B-17; and in the facts on little-known
491. experiments with remote bombing techniques, use of
H2X and electronic counter measures. Contains a host
68. Ibid., 158//. of previously unpublished information. 255-pages. A4
69. RAF Archives, Trenchard Papers, size. Published in England. Now available in U.S.. $17
including post and packing from Col. Ronald V. Kramer,
MFC76/1/32. 131 North Shore Drive, Syracuse, Indiana 46567.

SPRING, MARCH 1981 51

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