Evening star., 1939-10-19
French Flyers Feel
Able 10 Meet Nazis
On Even Terms
Confident British Pilots
GrumbIe at Lack
Of Air Action
BY WALTER DURANTY.


AT BRITISH AIR HEADQUAR-
TIERS, in France, Oct. 10 (N.A.N.A.).
1T is terribly interesting to talk
with these British flyers because
they give you an idea Of what Eng
land still means and why.
And not only England, but the
Empire, because, while you are talk
ing, there comes along an Austria
Ian In a uniform Of a darker blue
and says what he thinks. Or a
Canadian, who tells you eagerly, I'm
the last war, we only gave England
first-class flyers-1 mean Bishop
but now we can provide planes as
we'll"
A small English boy from Lam
cashire said, MY uncle was killed
in the last war because they sent
him to the front after seven hours
solo flying" The youth had had q
full years training.
Eary Fights With Carbines.
There was a French pilot who
said, II have had eight years train
ing, but it is only this year that I
have a plane In which I can engage
the enemy on level terms or better.
Now we have our own Moranes and
the American Curtisses. With them
we can smash the enemy's Messer-
schmidts. But am I right or wrong
in saying the pilot may be go per
cent, but the plane still counts for
40 per cent?"
No one ventured to argue that
point until a British officer said
quietly, Il first fought the Germans
in an old Farman biplane. My
armament was one carbine, and I
don't suppose the Germans had
much better-this was in 1914. NY
first air f1ght-you understand, I
was a gunner, not pilot-was en-
gagged at so meters. Our slow old
crates chugged around each other
while the German gunner and I
took potshots with our rifles. The
battle ended because neither scored
a direct hit and our ammunition of
about two dozen rounds was ex-
hausted. We were flying at 1000
feet, which was tiptop altitude in
those days, and all I remember was
how damnably cold it was
BOmbers Disdain Maneuver.
There was another chubby faced
Englishman listening. He had a
small scar on his chin which might
have been where his razor slipped,
but actually was fraction-inch
miss Of death from a German
planes machine gun bullet. He had
some 40 German planes shot down
to his credit in the last war and is
now a high officer of the Franco
British air staff.
when I joined the air force" he
said. I'VE had got beyond the rife
stage, but it was still rather hit-or-
miss. Then gradually the game de-
veloped until it became a question
OF maneuver-to get your adversary
IN such a position that you could
shoot him down."
From then on, it became a free
for-au discussion, from which two
trends emerged. The bomber pilots
had no esteem for maneuver and
thought it rather silly. Their idea
as Gen. Joseph Vuillemin, now the
commander in chief of the French
air force and the most famous
bombing plane leader in France,
told me in 1918-was that a group
of bombers, if it kept together, had
sufficient volume of fire to beat off
any pursuit plane attack.
The pursuit pilots still stick to
the theory that one lodges this way
and that until he gets a clear shot;
then the opponent goes down in
flames.
Army on Its Own.
This British Air Force is kind
of air army on its own. In other
words. it is made up of bombers and
the proper equipment of pursuit
planes for protection if needed. The
air force has been relatively in
active so far and employed on recon-
naissance work, or what have YOU
We newspapermen grumble at the
lack of news and. if you think it
doesn't burn up the British pilots
when their French friends talk about
this fight or that-then you don't
know the British pilots. But to date
there have been no British bombing
raids into Germany-and that is the