The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-09-27
NAVAL OFFICERS HOLD ARPLANE
 MERE ADJUNCT
Declare Operations At Sea Impossible With
 out Aid Of Ships

Editors note:
 Following is. the second of series of aruclts dealing with the coming iEvcst- gation into the comparative merits of the airplane and submarine in na- tional defense. The view of those who defend the battleship is contained in this article.
 Copyright, 1924)
 WASHINGTON, Sept. 26. The battleship is still the bulwark of the nations sea defense, the airplane is as yet an adjunct but an increasingly necessary adjunct Any scheme of na- tional defense must recognize this, and must proved for cooperation between the two branches of the service, each needed by the other.
 This, is brief, is the view of most naval officers toward the controversy which has broken out afresh. culminat- ing in an investigation of the relative merits of each, which begins next week. It is also the opinion of officials of the naval air service, who still stand by the battleship.
 Any plan of national defense which would shelve the battleship and place principal dependence upon aviation, which is almost the position taken by some "extremists" of the air school, is
  Moffett as national suicide" Though an admiral in the navy first, Moffett is in close touch with developments in aviation as head of the bureau of aero nautics of the navy.
 Navy Mems Argument
 The line of argument of naval officers is as follows:
 1. The operations or aircraft at ..o o,n aanandapf nr, c,yrf TO ships for their effectiveness.
 ?. If aircraft alone were depended upon, the country might defend itself against attack directed at the coasts, but it would be entirely on the defen- sive. and such a plan of defense would result ultimately in losing commerce, island possessions, and possibly lead to economical starvation in time.
 3. An air fleet retains its mastery only so long as it is able to stay in the air-if it cannot fall back on sur face ships it will ultimately fall in the sea-" as one officer puts it.
 Plane Partisans Reply
 In answer to advocates of the air plane that bombs dropped from the air naval officers point out:
 IL airplane contingents, they can be de tended against hostile attacks by their own airfleets.
 ?. Anti-aircraft guns keep hostile planes high/in the air, and the chances of hit are thus reduced.
 Naval officers give full credit to air craft as an adjunct, and praise it as making the fleet vastly more efficient than ever before. Admiral MOffett sets out his views as to the place of each.
 Means To End.'
 Tt is clair" he said, that the fleet, lacking the means to gain air suprem- acy. operates under fatal handicap. It is just as clear that air supremacy in a naval engagement can never be anything more than a means to an end. It can only be preliminary to the conclusive action fought out by surface ships.
 "The navy in the air and the navy on the sea is the strongest possible as- surance of national security, and to re- tire one in favor of the other is only comparable to the effectiveness of a gun without powder, soldier without eye sight, or a baseball pitcher without a
 
 The successful flight around the world by American aviators was pri- marily the cause for the renewal of the controversy, with the impression it made on President Coolidge, leading him to take a position in favor of greater attention to aviation and less to the navy.
 Supremacy Denied
 This flight, according to naval off cers, did not demonstrate the suprem- acy of the airplane, but on the con trary showed the dependence of airplane on surface vessels while at sea. It was pointed out that the flyers never could have crossed the Atlantic but for the cruisers which were guarding their course.
 Moffett compares the present wave in favor of the airplane with that some years ago for the torpedo boat.
 "The advent of the torpedo boat" he said, was heralded as the death knell of capital ships. Acting on what was at that time a popular fallacy, one great maritime power concentrated on the development of the torpedo boat and at the expense of capital ships. She surrendered the maritime prestige which she has never been able to re- gain"
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