New-York tribune., 1919-01-11

Major General George O. Squier,
chief signal officer of the army. who
had never entered a reply to the
charges of mismanagement brought
against him in the inquiry into the
aircraft situation. did so in effect last
night in an address before the Ameri-
can Institute of Electrical Engineers
at Engineers Hall, 25 West Thirty
ninth Street. Although General Squier
did not mention once the criticisms
that had been lodged against the air
service, he made complete account
ing OF his stewardship to the engineers.
He told of the difficulties met and
overcome, Of the speeding up of air
craft development in less than two
years to point which could not have
been hoped for in twenty years of
peaceful progress. The vastness and
remote ramiications of the problem he
indicated by counting the spruce logged
by the hundreds Of million feet, by
counting the aerial industrial army
and the uniformed forces by the hun
dreds of thousands and by describ-
ing the inventions and improvements
evolved, many of them of extreme
value in the peaceful evolution of
aernonautics, besides affording the
United States a unique advantage in
air warfare.
The Liberty motor, the improved
vacuum tube permitting vocal guild
ance of air squadrons, the production
of the hitherto rare and expensive
helium gas in quantities at a reasona-
Bile rate and the development of ex-
tensive meteorological and aerial
Typographical bureaus, whose work has
value in peace as we'll as in war, were
some Of the things to which General
Squier called attention.
General Squier's "Victory Creed"
He called attention to them, not as
his own products or even those of the
army air service, but as the work of
the organized genius of the nation put
ting into practice what he termed the
"Victory Creed" which he described
as follows:
"To foster individual talent, imagi-
nation and initiative, to couple with
this high degree of cooperation and
to subject these to not too minute
direction, the whole vitalized by su-
preme purpose which serves as the
magic key to unlock the upper strata
of the energies of men,"
Ten years ago General Squier spoke
from the same platform. At that time
the Signal Corps had just advertised
for bids on a heavicr-th -than-air flying
machine, the specifications of which
were filled by the Wright brothers.
During the succeeding eight years,
however, less than $1,O00,O0O was ap-
propriated for the development of mil
itary aeronautics in this country.
without attempting to discuss causes,
General Squier said that the declara-
tion Of war found the United States
few training planes" Then came the
s1o,ooo,ooo, 100000 and $500
100000 war appropriations for the pur-
pose, and now, General Squier said,
the flying schools have turned out more
than $500 trained military aviators.
Training Casualties Relatively Few
"There have been training fatalities
in the United States," General Squier
said, cas- in all other countries where
training has been conducted on large
scale. However, when the fact is real
lied that our students have flown more
than $4,000 hours, which is the equiv
alent to more than 66,OOO,0OO miles,
it will be seen that our training casu-
alties have been astonishingly few.
Statistics show that the United States
has a lower percentage of fatalities
than any other of the Allied countries.
The monthly average in the United
States has been only one fatality for
each 5000 hours flown.
more than 10000 Liberty engines
we're produced during the calendar
year 1918. 20 November II, 1918, more
than $4,000 Liberty engines were pro-
duced, equivalent to 100000 brake
horsepower The production of SER
vice balloons met all service require
ments.
"On November II, 1918, there had
been developed, tested and adopted by
the army four airplanes on which pro-
duction would have started early in