THERE’S A STING IN ITS TAIL

Southland Times, Issue 24153, 15 June 1940, Page 11

THERE’S A STING IN ITS TAIL

THERE was nothing halfhearted about the debut, over the Western Front, of the Royal Air Force’s newest fighter, the Boulton Paul Defiant.

One squadron’s achievement over Dunkirk—l 7 fighters and a dive-bomber shot down before lunch, 19 bombers certain, and possibly 21, in the afternoon, without losing one of the 12 British planes—must be a record without parallel in air war. PROM this distance, it looks as if the Defiant may be as great an asset as the two-seat Bristol Fighter was in 1917, when it changed the whole fortune of the war in the air and gave the Allies the superiority they needed to win on the ground, says the aviation writer of The Herald (Melbourne). There is this difference in the circumstances: then, the Germans had the lead in design; today, the Allies appear to have that already, and to need, more than anything else, great numbers of aeroplanes. But if the Defiant is as good as it seems to be, each one will do the work of more than one aeroplane of an earlier type. Since the days when the Hawker Demon was a first-line aeroplane, the Royal Air Force has had no two-seat fighters until now. Its fighters were, indeed, intended to be interceptors pure and simple—planes that could climb like a lift, catch any bomber and bring to bear on it the withering fire of eight machine-guns. The theory was that the dog-fight of the Great War was a freakish misuse of air power, produced by conditions that no longer existed. In any future war, unescorted bombers would strike far into the enemy country, as British bombers have recently been doing, and interceptors would try to bring them down.

The theory has turned out to be hopelessly wrong, as was foreshadowed in the Spanish civil war, which gave

a preview of German tactics. Against the dive-bombers that Germany, and now the Allies are using in huge numbers against infantry, fighters are essential defence. German raiders and reconnaissance machines are often escorted by fighters, so that a simple interception—up and at them, then back home—turns into a dog-fight. In fact, air fighting has been taken up almost exactly where it left off in tbe last war.

A Tragic Surprise MORE by good luck than good management, the Hurricane has proved itself an excellent rough and tumble combat fighter. It is more handy—“manoeuvrable” as the etymologists say—than any other fast fighter, and the 160 rounds its guns fire in a second are almost as shattering as a shell, and more likely to strike home. But with the dog-fight back in the air, an old saying comes true again—that a good two-seater will always beat a good single-seater. The fight over Dunkirk showed the value of the man in the rear cockpit. As Defiants dived on German bombers, Messerschmitts came out of the sun on the tails of the British machines, which the German pilots probably judged to be Hurricanes.

The British fighters continued in their dive, the pilots firing the fixed wingguns at the bombers; and as the Messerschmitts caught up they learned of the sting in the tail of the Defiant. They must have been as tragically surprised as were their predecessors in the last war when they found bullets streaming from what was then a still more unlikely place—straight out of the nose of a French plane. If a fighter gets on the tail of another single-seater, he has won his battle; if he gets on the tail of a two-seater, it is probably just too bad. Even one gun firing backward has some defensive value. It is the only protection of the Junkers JU 87 divebomber against fighters as it screams down on its target. But the Boulton-

Paul has four guns, not one, in its turret—as much firepower as the German fighters have in their main for-ward-firing armament. A gunner in one of the hydraulically driven turrets, able to swing his battery around as if there were no 300-mile-an-hour gale sweeping past him, is at a great advantage in straight shooting, compared with the pilot who has to aim his whole plane. So valuable is this turret that the Defiant can be regarded as just a platform for getting it into the air.

More New Types DETAILS of the Defiant’s armament are still secret, but it is safe to assume that some versions of it will have a shell-gun firing forward. Both Spitfires and Hurricanes have been experimentally equipped with shell-guns, with good results. And if tests show it is advisable, the Defiant’s rear gunner may be given a cannon, too. The Defiant will not for long be the only machine of its type. Since its first public appearance, about a year ago—it takes as long as that to get production —another has appeared. It is the Hawker Hotspur, of which we can expect to hear some time soon. It is a small aeroplane, like the Defiant, which, only 13 yards from wing-tip to wing-tip, is a shade smaller than the single-seater Hurricane. Single-engined two-seaters do not fill all the gaps in Britain’s fighter needs; a long-range escort fighter is something the Air Force is crying out for, and when it comes it will be a sensation. But, in the meantime, the Defiant is the star. It is no wonder that at tire Wolverhampton works, where Boulton-Paul’s are now struggling to double their output, every newspaper reference to the plane is pasted on the wall, under the inscription, “Our Work.” Or, for that matter, that 47-year-old J. D. North, chief designer, who eats and often sleeps in the factory, is one of the most-congratulated men in England.