Evening star., 1927-09-12

rress,ons OF the Development of com
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mer he. attended tnternat,ondt qridt,on
and radio conferences dbrodd. he Uetc
10000 miles in Europe.
Mrs. Davis and /, touring Europe
by airplane. attended a music hall
performances in London at which the
star attraction was a monologue ar
tist, the British version of VIII
Rogers. He got his big laugh out of
a bit of foolery in which it appeared
he thought Silesia was an actress.
This happened to be a sophisticated
audience. A large part of Western
Europe probably has somewhat the
same idea about Silesia. Experiences
like this began to outline the prob
lem of Southeastern Europe as we
had never glimpsed it before In Cen
trail and Western Europe, where the
economic life is being revitaliZed, and
order is gradually appearing out OF
the political chaos, there is little reali-
cation Of what is happening across
the Transylvanian Alps.
The gangster nations of the Balkans
are still brewing trouble. European
statesma anship, SO far as this situation
Is concerned, is something like picking
a sore. Possibly the great new eco
nomic forces unleashed by industry
and science may some day drain the
Balkans OF their wars and hatredS.
We made some inquiries, but they
were not altogether reassuring.
Extending from southwestern Mon
tenegro to northeas stern Ruma MIA is
q line Of demarcation between ancient
feudalism and modern industrialism
Northwest Of this line ;here is in
creasing economic unity, with CORE
spending lessening Of political dissen-
sion. furthered tremendously by the
development OF commercial aviation
under the leadership of Germany.
with its great Luft Hansa system.
Southeast of this line they are de-
veloping and using aircraft. Medieval
statecraft has found them powerful
and useful weapons Of war.
Prague. we found, is becoming the
great commercial entrepot to the
Balkans We flew from Paris to
Prague in one of the graceful French
"Bluebird" Farman biplanes, via
Strasbourg. This is the main line of
the great French colonial route to
the Near East. and continues from
Prague through Vienna, Budapest,
Bucharest and ConstantinOple.
Fighting Planes for Balkans.
Ships carrying passengers and en-
gagged in business of state make the
Journey from Paris to Constantinople
comfortably in two days-about one
third Of the time required in railroad
travel. These colonial routes are
reaching out everywhere from Europe
into Asia and Africa. One realizes that
here are significant beginnings in
building new empires and reshaping
old ones
Visiting the international aircraft
exhibition at Prague, we were con-
frmed in our previous ideas of just
what kind of aviation development
Is going on in southeastern Europe.
to be sure. has gone
In for commercial aircraft, but this
does not mean what it does in France
and Germany. 1t is commercial avia
tion in the sense that Prague finds
1t good business to feed fighting
planes into the Balkans. The entire
emphasis of the Prague exposition
was on military planes.
The great Czechoslovakian COM
pany which makes the "Avia" plares
swift. waspish fighting ships-is
doing flourishing business in put
ting Balkan animosities on an air
footing. The Czechs have been par
ticularly successful in engine design
and construction, and have won
notable victories in competitions in
Italy, France and Belgium. At the
exposition there was an impressive
display of training planes, scout
planes, bombing planes and fighting
craft of all sorts, including specially
designed climbers which can shoot up
to an altitude of $1,000 feet in eight
minutes. There was on view only one
good eight passenger biplane.
In CZechoslovakia itself interest
and development centers on war
There are state lines on
which De Havilland SOS are in use
and on which regular service is main
tanned to a few points. The trans
port of passengers and goods is small
and is at present far from being an
economic factor of Importance. The
bulk of Czechoslovakias technical
and inventive resources are going
into the development of military
planes.
Real progress in the air began
when designers realized that wide de- ]
partures from military design were
necessary for commercial planes. This
is qualified somewhat by details of
engine design. The Czech war en-
gines have contributed decidedly to
factors of engine endurance
The. Germans have become interest
ed in this and are watching it closely,