The Romance of Aircraft | German Airplanes in the World War | Chapter 15
When we read the story of the wonderful contributions made by France, England, Italy, and America to the progress of aviation and to the romantic history of the heavier-than-air machine, we must remember that it is the story of nations which, a few short years ago, had no thought of turning the airplane into a mere weapon of destruction and desolation. It was the conquest of the air, for its own sake, that appealed to the fiery imaginations of the French, and that made them, from the day when the first Montgolfier balloon went soaring into the clouds, down to the early triumphs of the airplane in France and the great contests and meetings that followed them, ardent enthusiasts over each and every form of aerial sport. England, in spite of the fact that her sportsmen fliers were winning new triumphs daily, and in spite of the public interest that was taken from the very beginning in the advance of aviation, had, at the beginning of 1911, just one military airplane. America, ardent devotee of Peace, even while the World War was raging in Europe, failed to take steps to provide herself with an aerial fleet.
But when we come to Germany, the story of aviation takes an entirely different turn. The Germans as a people were never wildly enthusiastic over airplanes, for they lacked the fine sportsmanship and love of daring adventure which produced so many clever aviators in other lands. In fact, until they saw its utter inability to compete with the heavier-than-air machine as a military weapon, they confined themselves almost entirely to the construction of the safe and comfortable dirigible. With the possible exception of such a man as Lilienthal, the Germans took slight personal interest in the subject of human flight. It was the German government that, by lavish expenditure, and by every means known to it, encouraged experiment and progress.
The whole thought in Germany, both in the days of the dirigible and later, when the airplane had proved its superiority, was solely to develop the flying machine as an instrument of war. It was for this that she began her costly and gigantic program of Zeppelin construction, it was for this that the best engineers in the Empire were set to work designing aeronautic engines. It was not without some chagrin that the German military authorities gave up their dream of world conquest by means of the Zeppelin, and set themselves to building airplanes instead. Yet when they did, they applied to the new problem the same thoroughness, the same military precision and uniformity that had marked their earlier program. Reading of the French machines we are fascinated by the many types and patterns that the ingenious Frenchmen were able to devise. In Germany everything was carefully systematized by the government, individual designs were discouraged unless they fitted into the military scheme of things, and the airplane was produced in large numbers, like so many blackjacks, all exactly alike, to be used in striking the peaceful nations of the world.
German thoroughness went a long way in perfecting the airplane as a war instrument. When, in August 1914, her sword finally descended, she had close on to 800 machines and a thousand trained pilots, together with a small force of seaplanes and pilots. To-day, according to an English authority, she has at least 20,000 aircraft of all sorts, manned by a force of 300,000 pilots, observers, and bombardiers.
The first German machines to fly over French territory might well have struck terror to the hearts of the plucky French, for they were equipped with the cleverest instruments of destruction that Germany could devise. The swept-back, curved wings of these standard biplanes won them the name of Taube or “dove.” Certainly they were not “doves of peace.” They were equipped with wireless, carried cameras for reconnaissance work, had the most accurate recorders of height and speed, dependable compasses, instruments for bomb-dropping, dual control systems, so that they could be operated by either pilot or observer, and dozens of other small improvements and accessories that made them more than a match for the French machines sent up to dispute their supremacy in the air. The challenge these machines presented to the genius of the French was taken up with vigor. It was not long before they found themselves an obsolete form of aircraft in the great war in the air, and for all their inventions and improvements, they were forced back into their hangars.
By the Spring of 1915, the French were soaring through the sky in fast fighting machines that made the air a very unsafe place for the plodding German “maid-of-all-work.” The Germans bestirred themselves to think of some method of getting even with these unreasonable French pilots, who somehow refused to admit defeat. The machine which they sent out in answer to the Nieuport monoplane and others of its type was the invention of a Dutchman; it succeeded in creating quite a sensation for a while in Allied circles, until like others of its company it was superseded by French inventive genius and rendered a more or less harmless craft.
This supposedly invincible fighter was the Fokker. In general construction it was largely an imitation of the French Morane monoplane, but it had one entirely new feature that rendered it at the time a formidable adversary. That was what was known as a synchronized gun, firing through the propeller.
The problem had been to design a machine which could be operated by one man, who became both the pilot and the gunner. In order to do this he must necessarily be able to control the direction of his machine in flight and aim his gun at the enemy at the same time. The best way to accomplish this was to point the nose of his machine at his victim and fire straight ahead of him. But here the propeller was the great obstacle. How could he fire a gun from the bow of his machine without striking the propeller blades as they whirled swiftly about in front of him? The German Fokker answered that question. The machine gun with which it was equipped had its shots so synchronized, or “timed,” that, impossible as it seems, they passed between the rapidly revolving propeller blades without striking them. The Fokker was a remarkable climber in its day, and in addition it had a simple device by which the pilot could lock the control of the elevating planes, steering only to right or to left, by means of pedals worked with his feet.
Early in 1916 this deadly weapon of aerial warfare made its appearance, and for a while the civilian population of England and France read with dismay of its conquests. Mounting high into the clouds, it would await its victim. The moment a machine of the Allies appeared beneath it, the Fokker turned its nose straight down and went speeding in the direction of its prey, opening fire as soon as it got within range. There was no use of the unfortunate airplane trying to escape. The Fokker could, by wobbling its nose slightly in spiral fashion as it descended, produce, not a straight stream of bullets ahead of it but a cone of fire from its machine gun, with the victim in the center of the circle. Whichever way the latter turned to escape it met a curtain of bullets which could destroy it. The Allied machines could only combat it in groups of three and for a time at least it held supremacy in the skies. When itself pursued by a superior number of planes, it was quick as an acrobat, and speedy at climbing, so that it very seldom could be caught.
This was the machine in which the two famous German airmen, Immelmann and Boelke performed some of their most daring exploits. It traveled at a speed of more than 100 miles per hour and could perform surprising feats with the most alarming ease.
But while the Fokker's début over the trenches caused the British House of Commons to debate the new peril gravely, French and British airmen sprang quickly and gaily to the challenge. Heedless of the danger, they braved the bullets of the Fokker in order to get a better view of its mechanism, and they soon answered it with swift and powerful machines like the British De Havilland. It was only a short while before the Fokker monoplane was “behind the times.” Faster machines with greater climbing powers overtook it in the skies and swooped down upon it from superior altitudes, as it had swooped down upon so many of its victims. Its day of triumph at an end, it withdrew to the seclusion of its hangar, and the Fokker biplane replaced it in the air. This in its turn became the steed of many of Germany's star aerial performers.
Now came the days when Captain Baron von Richthofen held forth in the heavens with his squadrons of variegated planes which the British airmen nicknamed “Richthofen's circus.” These queerly “camouflaged” planes were German Albatroses. The Albatros was one of the best designed of the German airplanes, and although the first models produced were not remarkable for their speed, they were good climbers and weight-carriers and thoroughly reliable. They were later developed in two distinct types: a fast “speed scout” biplane single-seater, equipped with two machine guns both firing across the propeller; and a slower reconnaissance airplane, for general service over the lines. The latter carried both a pilot and an observer, and had two machine guns, one to be fired by each of them.
It was not long before the Allies had several captured machines of this type in their possession. An Austrian Albatros reconnaissance biplane, taken in 1916, afforded an interesting opportunity to examine what was at that time one of the very best of the enemy's planes. Its general construction did not entirely meet with the approval of expert airmen who looked it over. Its upper wing was much longer from tip to tip than the lower, producing a very great overhang. From the point of view of the pilot this had its advantage, for the shorter plane below him allowed a much better range of vision, but it undoubtedly weakened the whole structure. The biplane was exceedingly slow in flight, a great drawback even in a machine not built for fighting purposes. One curious feature was its very large fixed tail plane, to which the elevating plane was attached; while a decided defect from a military standpoint was the entirely unprotected position of the pilot and the observer.
Obviously the Germans had not yet solved the problem of air supremacy to their complete satisfaction. But their engineers and designers were busy thinking it over, and soon they had ready a number of swifter airplanes, foremost among which were probably the Aviatik and the Halberstadt. The Aviatik made great claims of superior accomplishments over the front lines. German pilots boasted that it had a “ceiling” (a climbing capacity) of almost 16,000 feet with pilot, observer and a fuel supply. This was over 4,000 feet greater altitude than that which any other Allied or enemy machine could reach under similar conditions. The machine had an upper wing span of 40 feet, 8 inches, while its lower wing measured 35 feet, 5 inches from tip to tip. It had a strong armor of steel tubing surrounding the compartment or “cockpit” which held the seats of the pilot and observer.
The Aviatik was an efficient bombing biplane of its day, although larger and more powerful machines have since come into the field to supersede it. It was fitted with metal bomb-launching tubes at either side of the bow, and the bombs were released by pulling a cable connected with the releasing trigger. The Aviatik was armed in addition with rotating machine guns, able to fire in any direction in an aerial battle.
The Halberstadt was a swift fighting machine or speed scout, which made its appearance in the third year of the war and proved efficient and reliable. This and the combat planes that followed it showed greater and greater speed until by 1917 the scout machines were flying at 150 miles per hour and climbing to altitudes as high as 22,000 feet.
It was the bombing plane, however, that appealed most strongly to the German mind as an instrument of destruction. Tired, perhaps, of their efforts to produce a fighting machine which should be without its match in aerial warfare, they focussed their attention about this time upon the bomber, which in 1917 was playing an ever more important role in the struggle for air supremacy. Early in 1917, the flower of their creative genius took to the air. It was the Gotha biplane, and at the time of its début it proved one of the most difficult machines to attack and down of any of those flying for the Hun. The Gun-tunnel Gotha it was familiarly called, owing to the unusual means of defense against pursuers that had been devised for it.
Up to this time one of the best methods of attacking an enemy plane had been to come up suddenly and fire on it “under its tail.” The gunner in the machine thus attacked could not get in a single shot at his pursuer without striking the tail planes of his own machine. The portion of an airplane which can be fired on in this way without danger of return fire is said to be its “blind spot,” and it was this blind spot that sent many a well-armed and powerful airplane crashing to earth when its pursuers had succeeded in outmaneuvering it.
The Gun-tunnel Gotha had practically no blind spot. Its designers had constructed it with a tunnel that ran the length of the fuselage, from the cockpit, or compartment where the pilot and gunners sat, through to an opening just under the tail planes. A machine gun in the cockpit could be pointed through this tunnel and fired at the unsuspecting victim who came up back of it according to the most approved tactics. The opening of the gun tunnel was carefully “camouflaged,” so that at a short distance it could not be seen by an attacking airplane, especially one which was unprepared for it.
The Gotha practically bristled with machine guns. One in its bow which commanded a fairly large range was operated by the forward observer, who sat in front of the pilot. A passage-way beside the pilot's seat allowed him to reach “gun-tunnel,” where, stretched flat on the floor of the fuselage he operated the gun which fired out under the tail. Above him in the fuselage sat the rear gunner, and by their combined aid the Gotha could keep all enemy planes at a safe distance.
These, however, were merely protective measures. The Gotha's real mission was bombing, and for this it carried a bomb-releasing mechanism just in front of the pilot's seat, on the floor of the fuselage, while behind the pilot an additional supply of the death-dealing missiles were carried in racks in vertical position.
These were the machines which flew over England and France in 1917 scattering death and destruction. Against them the machines of the Allies were for a time almost powerless, for the best of their airplanes were completely outgunned by this new terror of the skies. The new German machine was given one of its first tryouts in the Balkans, where a squadron of twin-engined Gothas accomplished the bombing of Bucharest. Its efficiency proved, it appeared over the lines and was also used extensively by the Germans for long distance bombing operations.
The fact that the Gothas flew in large squadrons made them still more difficult to attack. Yet Allied airplanes went out to give them fight, and in spite of what seemed the almost complete hopelessness of the situation, they did succeed in breaking up Gotha formations and in downing a few of the dread machines.
Yet another German twin-winged bombing plane was ready about this time. The Friedrichshafen bomber was not so large as the Gotha, but in many points of construction it resembled it. A biplane, it had wings that tapered somewhat from the center to the tips. The wings were strengthened by center spars of steel tubing, which was also used in the construction of the rudder and elevators at the tail. The pilot occupied the rear seat in the cockpit and the gunner the forward seat, while a short passage-way ran between the two. Every effort had been made at camouflage. On their upper surfaces the wings were painted as nearly as possible earth color, so that they might be indistinguishable to a machine looking down upon them from a superior altitude. On their lower surfaces they were painted pale blue, to blend with the sky and make them invisible to an enemy plane below.
The armament of this Friedrichshafen bomber consisted of three machine guns, one of them firing downward through a trap door in the fuselage. It was fitted with an automatic bomb-releasing apparatus, by means of which, as one bomb was released, another slipped into place.
Other bombing machines appeared in 1917, as the A.E.G. twin-motored tractor biplane, and the A.G.O. twin-bodied biplane. The Germans also began construction of huge bombing triplanes, heavily armed with machine guns. With squadrons of these, the Gothas, and the Friedrichshafens, they carried out in 1917 and 1918 an established program of bombardment. The night no longer held terrors for their airmen, who had learned to fly in the darkness. They made their raiding expeditions, not only against Allied troops and military bases, but also on English and French towns, killing civilians and children and destroying property of no importance from a military point of view.
By these methods the Hun had hoped to acquire the supremacy of the air which his smaller fighting machines had not yet won for him. Fortunately the French and British had been hard at work, and in answer to the forays of the German bombing planes, squadrons of Allied planes dropped their missiles in the heart of Germany. The Allied planes, however, chose military objectives, and did not aim their blows at defenseless civilians.
Stroke for stroke, and with a little extra for good measure the Allies beat back their opponents in the air. To-day some of the most remarkable raiding machines in existence, whether for night or for day work belong to France and England, while America is leaving no stone unturned to build up an air navy the equal of those by whose side she fought.
Yet the war in the air, on the Allied side, was always marked by honor, decency and humanity. The enemy repeatedly showed that not mere military gains, but the savage pleasure of bombing civilians, was a part of his air program. In March, 1918, nine squadrons of his airplanes flew over Paris and attacked the city. The raid resulted in 100 deaths, besides 79 people injured, a shocking story to go down in the record of the Hun's attempt at mastery of the air.
Mr. Baker, our American Secretary of War, was in Paris at the time when this historic raid occurred. He was holding a conference at his hotel with General Tasker H. Bliss, at the time American Chief of Staff, when the French warning siren was sounded throughout the city. The city was covered with a deep fog, that completely shielded from the view of the German machines any possible objective. But they had no intention of choosing targets for their bombs,—they let them fall at random upon Paris. For almost three hours terror reigned among the helpless civilians; then the raiders, having lost four of their number to the anti-aircraft gunners, turned and sped swiftly toward their own lines. “It was a revelation,” said Mr. Baker, “of the methods inaugurated by an enemy who wages the same war against women and children as against soldiers.... We are sending our soldiers to Europe to fight until the world is delivered from these horrors.”
London as well as Paris suffered from enemy bombing planes. Raid followed raid in the Spring of 1918, but the British had so improved their aerial defenses that they were able to meet the attempted ravages of the enemy with the most powerful anti-aircraft guns, which, like a wall of fire, forbade the dread monsters to come within the limits of the metropolis. Many machines in the German squadrons never got close enough to London to bomb it, but those which did let fall their terrible explosives without aim or object, killing and maiming a large number of civilians. The British were finally forced to take the only course which could have effect with the Hun. They flew into the heart of the enemy's country and gave him a taste of his own medicine. True, they chose their objectives carefully, and the targets which they bombed were munition works, railways, factories, and camps, but for all their tempered revenge they made the foe smart beneath the stinging lash that descended, again and again, upon his back.
In answer to the aircraft program of the United States, Germany renewed her energies, and her construction of airplanes during the last year of the War was on a larger scale than ever before. Her small fighting machines, or speed scouts, include the Fokker, the Halberstadt, the Roland, the Albatros, the Aviatik, the Pfalz monoplane, the Rumpler, the L.V.W. and a number of others.
Some of these we have already seen at work. The Roland is one of the latest types of German two-seater scouts. Every effort has been made in it to decrease the “head resistance” by careful streamlining, reduction of the number of interplane struts, etc. Swift flying and a rapid climber, it has won for itself the title of The German Spad. The Pfalz is built either as a monoplane or as a biplane. It is a machine somewhat similar to the Fokker. The monoplane, however, has two machine guns, one on each side of the pilot, and firing through the propeller.
Among airplanes used by the enemy for general service duties over the lines, the A.G.O., the A.E.G. and the Gotha undoubtedly take the lead. All are heavily armed with machine guns and bombs and are driven by powerful motors.
Yet for all the desperate German struggle for supremacy, her machines and her pilots did not prove the equals of the Allies in the air. The airplanes of France, England, Italy and America maintained a ceaseless vigilance over the lines, giving chase to every enemy plane or squadron of planes that made its appearance on the horizon. Our airmen showed the most dauntless courage, and they continually outwitted and outmaneuvered the slower thinking Hun. Our speed scouts challenged his reconnaissance and bombing planes, and prevented them from performing their missions effectively; our own reconnaissance airplanes gave him a hard time of it; and our bombing machines proved themselves the strong right arm of the service—taking the place of the big guns in raining heavy explosives upon enemy troops, bombing his military bases, and making life in general most uncomfortable for the foe.
It is a far cry from those first standardized Taubes to the many makes and patterns of German airplanes of the present day. As the Allies met those first maids-of-all-work with a mixed company of airplanes of many and untried talents, so to-day they are meeting her efforts to imitate their own versatility in aircraft with machines which are carefully standardized in every detail. It should be an object lesson to Germany that the Allies have triumphed in each case.
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