Evening star., 1943-12-15

quantity-more and more guns of
ever greater rate of fire and caliber,
to saturate the air above with steel
1t would be wrong to suppose,
however, that aviation can be
stymied on this basis. What can
be expected-and that in the near
future-is the emergence of in
genious new weapons of type that
will make the fullest use of the
special possibilities and character
istics Of airplanes. One such new
weapon which already can be dis
cerned is an aerial torpedo of many
varieties for use against surface
ships, displacing the present naval
torpedo
The air torpedo which the writer
foreseeS will not move slowly
through water. 1t will travel
through the air, and because un-
hindered by water resistance it will
surpaSS the speed of sound which is
1,10O feet a second. The present
skip" bombing will thus leave the
water altogether and will become
skim" bombing-skimming the sur
face Of the sea until it strikes the
appointed target. Moreover, there
will be virtually no limit to the size
of these air torpedoes. We now
bomb vertically with Atom block
busters. Aircraft will be able to
hurl such bombs horizontally from
ever greater distances.
Ship Too Slow to Move.
Already dive bombers are in view
which, as they level off at the
bottom of their dive, develop the
speed of sound. Releasing an
aerial torpedo while leveling off,
such planes can send several tons
of steel and TINT, incased in an
armor- piercing jacket, crashing into
the side of battleship.
The ship cannot possibly move
out of the path of this sort of pro-
Jectlle. 1t cannot deviate from its
course or appreciably vary its speed
which is roughly 40 feet per second,
In the four or five seconds that it will
take the torpedo to reach its target
For all practical purposes the target
will be stationary.
Ships will thus be attacked from
a distance beyond the effective
range of their defenses. They will
be able to counter such attacks only
with the help of airplanes-thus
transferring the whole struggle to
the air.
In its further refinement, the air
torpedo is likely to become self
propelled through jet propulsion, or
as it is more commonly called,
rocket propulsion. Already Ger
many uses the rocket principle to
catapult heavy bombers into the
air. This principle will be applied
to extend the range from which the
weapon can be launched. In addi-
tion, the torpedo will sprout small
wings, like fins, that will enable it
to knife through the air in a straight
line just above the water. Just
before striking, of course, the air
torpedo can plunge if necessary and
explode beneath the water to get
the benefit of the water impact:
also it will adapt for its uses all
the acoustic and magnetic devices
now employed by naval torpedoes,
which direct them to the target.
New Projectiles Foreseen.
In the coming contest between
battleships and airplanes we can
thus visualize air attack not merely
by the present type of bombing, but
by huge projectiles flying through
the air at enormous speeds, by
armor- piercing bombs driven by
rocket propulsion, by many-tonned
air torpedoes skimming the sur
face with a speed greater than sound
and striking from all directions.
The struggle is bound to become
uneven, with the advantage over
whelningly on the side of air at
tackers. Pitted against ships, avi-
alton will have the tactical freedom
of three dimensions-an ability
that is, to move not only in any
direction but up and down-while
the defenders can only move slowly
on the surface. The speed factor
will enable the airplanes to release
weights Of destruction far beyond
what a ship can fire-weights that