Evening star., 1934-11-18
CONTINUED From First Page.)

come suddenly. Enemy airplanes will
appear overhead, flying in formation.
With deadly aim they will hurl upon
defenseless cities and innocent people
thousands of steel bombs filled with
high explosives.
Experts Study Problem.
As ]. B. Kennedy in the nineteenth
century of London put it: I'm this
war there will be no front, there will
be no rear. There will be no place
of safety. The old will perish with
the young, the women with the chill
dren, the pacifist with the fire-eater."
How to protect the Nation from
such holocaust is the problem facing
military experts. The American Army
general staff and the experts of the
Coast Artillery say our dependence
must be upon the Navy in the first
instance, with the Air Corps as Sec
ond line of defense and anti-aircraft
guns as the final defending arm. In
terwoven with all three must be a
system of far-f1ung Intelligence nets.
Our intelligence nets abroad will be
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will enable our naval forces to de-
stroy enemy airplane carriers and
thus prevent devastating raid.
Intelligence nets in this country will
be necessary to detect the approach
of the enemy which might have eluded
the Navy. From these sources of in
formation it is expected that timely
warnings will be transmitted through
many communicating links to variously
located Air Corps units.
The Peril of an Air Raid.
II the Navy fails in its task a feet
Of airplane carriers, disguised as mer-
chant ships, might succeed in arriving
some dark night off the Atlantic Coast,
say between Cape Charles and the
airplane has sufficient fuel for cruis-
ing radius of 800 miles, more than
ample for a flight to Washington, the
bombing of the city and return trip
to the carriers.
Failure of the intelligence nets
spread along the coast to discover and
inform the Air Corps would enable the
air raiders to attain their objective.
Some military experts even claim that
in spite of the most alert Navy and
Air Corps the bomber will always get
through, at least to the third line of
defense-the anti-aircraft batteries.
When it is understood that the
enemy can reach Washington in ap-
proximately an hour and a half from
the rendezvous suggested above it will
be seen that for every mile travelled
in the direction of the Capital with
out being discovered there is pro-
gressively increasing chance of his
reaching the city unmolested. This
is due to the time required for the Air
Corps to get in the air, locate the
raiders and engage in combat.
Should warning not reach the Air
Corps in time to locate, intercept and
defeat the bombing planes. the third
line becomes the last defense of the
threatened city. Within Is minutes
after receiving word of the approach
Of the enemy this line can be ready
for action.
But this third line of defense does
not exist to protect Washington.
Maj. H. A. Dargue, A. c., writing
In the Coast Artillery Journal, says
THE mission of the bomber involves
putting his eggs in the nest for which
they are intended; the mission of the
defenders on the ground contemplates
keeping the aviator from ever reach
ing the point where the eggs are pro-
posed to be laid"
City without Batteries.
Washington is the nest" which
Mai. Dargue assumes is amply pro-
tected by an adequate number of