DEFENCE PROBLEMS

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 105, 31 October 1933, Page 9

DEFENCE PROBLEMS

"AIR-SEA" EXERCISES

"DIVING BOMBERS" IN ACTION

SOME LESSONS (LEAMT

(From "the Post's" Representative.) LONDON, September 29.

Material for- months of intensive study by the men who are responsible for tho strategy and tactics of Imperial defence was obtained in the fifteen spectacular hours of tho first large-scale "air-sea" exercise, which engaged tho Boyal Navy and the Eoyal Air Force in mimic war over an area of nearly one thousand square miles, of/the North Sea. Though the exercise was inevitably artificial in many points, safety and simplicity dictating certain governing conditions which would not apply" in actual warfare, it has thrown new light on tho potentialities of the flying machine, and may lead to important changes in the present organisation of coastal defence.

The '''w,ar" holds lessons for the Dominions equal in importance to those involving tho defence of the Home country. Every one of the nations which make up tho British Commonwealth has a lengthy coastline to defend; from the maze of the exercise there should emerge concrete proposals for the better solution of the tremendous problem of maintaining^ national Vtcgrity in a war emergency which constantly engages the anxious thought of the Empire's Defence Ministers. Tho opposing forces were, at first sight, unequally matched. On one side was the Bed "enemy" fleet —three capital ships, two aircraft carriers, throe fcruisers, twenty-one destroyers, and fifty-four aeroplanes. This formidable squadron sought to bombard a defended base, represented by the town of Elie on tho shore of the Firth of Forth, Scotland. The defence was entrusted to an air army of nine squadrons, employing rather less than ninety flying boats, bombers, and torpedo-planes. Further, defence was handicapped by the assumption that during the whole of the first phase of the exercise the attacking fleet was beyond tho range of land-based aircraft, though the shipborne "enemy" aeroplanes could reach the land. No fighting aircraft were available for the defence of the land bases, and no naval vessels co-operated with the Blue squadrons. On tho other hand the Red attackers wore enjoined, to maintain, the low cruising speed of twelve knots, and their assaults had perforce to be made within prescribed hours of daylight. ■ '■'■''.

OPEN SEA RECONNAISSANCE,

The first phase of thp''' war,' 'i occupying seven hours, was iixtendod primarily to exercise flying-boats in long distance open sea reconnaissance and ship recognition. Single aeroplanes camo in from the Bed fleet in efforts to damage land aerodromes and defending aircraft. Visibility was perfect, and the flyingboats—nine of the veteran Supermarine ''Southampton" twin-engined craft— had little difficulty/ in locating and recognising the various units of the attacking fleet. Badio messages to defence headquarters gave precise details of the location of the surface ships, the course they were steering, and their approximate speed. Working outwards fanfashion from the shore base the aeroplanes covered successfully the whole of the area of 600 square miles concerned in-"/the first phase o£ the operations. ■"■.,'

During- the night the Bed ships changed formation and positions. ; The area of the "war" was enlarged. Defending bombers and torpedo-planes, restricted on the previous day to patrol on the' look-out for Eed air' raiders, entered the fray.

In the' eight hours of the" second phase no fewer than nineteen raids wero directed against the attacking fleet. Two were aimed against Rod aircraft carriers, fifteen against tho main fleet, and two by torpedo-piano wero concentrated on the capital ships. No defending squadron made less than two raids', and one—a unit equipped with the fast' Hawker "Hart" singlc-engincd day bomber- biplanes—made four separato attacks, the last only one minute before the "cease fire." The longest time taken by a squadron to roach its. floating objective was just over an hour, and the shortest eleven minutes from the moment of ascent fronl the shore aerodrome.

AIRCRAFT CARRIERS ATTACKED,

Tho first. to establish contact with the enemy was a squadron of powerful twin-engined Boulton-Paul . "Sidestrand'' bombers, which attacked fifty miles out to sea a formation of thrco capital ships, three cruisers, and attendant destroyers.- Bombs, simulated by light signals, were launched from a height of 5000 feet. Later in the day the same unit attacked the-, aircraft carriers, and the machine is estimated to have dropped in a few seconds forty-eight bombs on their exposed and vulnerable flying decks in spite of the attentions of .«three high-speed "Osprcy".ship-board fighters which engaged the raiders.

Most spectacular were the raids of the "Hart" squadrons. At a height of 11,000 ft one of theso units, moving at a cruising speed of 160 miles an hour, slipped through a gap in tho clouds and straddled two of the world's biggest battleships, the Warspitc and" the Malaya, with a pattern of 250' pound bombs; apparently the aeroplanes were not observed from below till the moment of thch' arrival in the diamond formation adopted for attacks on 'a moving target. Though the big ships went hard apart and continued turning, expert observers declare that they could not have escaped a large proportion of the "bombs."

Yet more thrilling work was planned. A second "Hart" squadron was detailed for diving-bombing attacks on the surface vessols. In this sensational manoeuvre no bomb sights are employed; the aeroplane itself is directed at tho target below and the bomb is released.when tho pilot is satisfied that the aim is good and that tho aeroplane has reached its maximum diving speed of well over 300. miles an hour. Thus launched, tho bomb gains additional penetrative- power from the speed of the machine.

'.'HELL DIVERS."

In.eleven minutes from the moment of take-off the '.'Hurt" squadron, in position 10,OOOft above- the Bed fleet, had separated into four flights, each of three machines, for the breath-taking dive. As tho leader of each flight flew abreast of the warship to be attacked ho tilted over towards her in an abrupt "stalled" turn and swung down in a vertical dive towards tho target. Behind him screamed his accompanying machines. Tho speed of descent accelerated in a wail of streamlined wires till the air-speed indicator pointed to 300 m.p.h. and over. Tho men in the machines swallowed to overcomo the sensation of vest increase of pressure in the eardrums. In less than twenty seconds the aeroplanes were only 2000 ft above their target, tho "bombs" were released1, and each pilot had begun to pull steadily out of the dive. Now the bo'die? of the airmen experienced to tho full the gravitational forces released in the chango from tho five-milcs-a-

minute dive to level flight

subsequent zooming climb back to a safe altitude. They felt momentarily in danger of being forced through the floor of the fuselage. Gradually the

strain eased and the climb began. Within eight minutes the unit had resumed formation at more than, 10,OOOft above tho sea and was heading for thq coast. Actually every machine of the squadron had dived, released its bomb-load, and begun to climb away *n forty seconds from the instant when tho squadron leader first tilted his machine in the signal to attack.

Torpedo-plane attacks on the fleet, entrusted to a squadron of Blackburn "Bipon" biplanes, were equally effective. These craft released their missiles when moving about twenty, feet abovo tho surface at the bottom of a fast gradual dive. One battleship, the Warspite, was hit by six torpedoes, another—rthe Malaya—by one. Tho Eonown alone escaped. Meanwhile, the surfaco ships, with their complement of flying machines, were engaged in heavy anti-aircraft "fire" and in aorial attacks on tho raiding aeroplanes which, in actual warfare, would undoubtedly have accounted for numbers of the Blue

machines,

COASTAL DEFENCE UNITS NEEDED.

The exercise cannot be hold conclusive of the power of the aeroplane against the surface ship. Much hasty comment has hailed the operations as proof of the supremacy of the flying machine—which is seductively inexpensive in comparison with battleship, cruiser, or destroyer-^and the inevitable eclipse of the warship. The governing conditions were far too artificial to permit of such wild conclusions. That the torpedo-plane and the diving bomber are a'serious menace to warships has long been admitted; how far the Fleet can sustain a successful defence against the ; air raiders, particularly with the help of a really powerful Air Arm, is' matter for much further experiment.

■ flerhaps the most important single lesson that can be drawn at once from the,"war" is the need for coastal defence air squadrons, of which none yet oxists. The most authoritative naval opinion holds that shore-based aeroplanes can play an important part in ftho defenco of vsluablo harbours and fleet bases during any , future war. Further, every enemy .fleet of the future will be lavishly equipped with flying machines for purposes of attack and bombardment ■as well as reconnaissance and gunnery spotting. And it is an axiom that • only aircraft can satisfactorily deal* with enemy aircraft, no, matter how efficient may be the supporting ground defence system. Here, then, is an, obvious and serious gap in the existing,system of coastal defence which calls for early remedy.

Two* types of flying machine performed duties not usually expected of them, indicating profitable extension of their activities. Thus the Blue bombing aeroplanes were employed in active defence evolutions, against incoming raiders. Evidently bombing aircraft can do much in' the defence of territory at the moment of attack, and there is room for a,new class of combined bomber and two-seater fighter. Further, the flying boat, intended primarily for reconnaissance, indicated that it may become a formidable factor in actual offensive operations.