ATR POLICE

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8178, 3 May 1919, Page 2 (Supplement)

ATR POLICE

By “NIGHT-HAWK. Tiie experiences of war taught us tha: on nine oeasions out of ten it was poss Me to provent enemy aeroplanes Iron crossing any given zone. If, for example, concentrations ol troops were taking .place within i civ tain area, and it was desired to con ni this information from the German Staff, an offensive patrol was worked in two-j hourly shifts along ,a defined belt in' front of the concentration area. The orders to the pilots of this patrol ww simply to keep enemy fivers awnv; and, I being mounted on the finest- and fastest] machines in the service, they gen j a-ly succeeded.

ITus method of patrolling over defined belts of territory will doi'htless b? adopted by the Aeriai Customs Service, as soon as the International Air have been formulated and approved If the nations. Three things are essential to its excess. Air po.'ice, entrusted with the task of preventing smuggling, must If exceptionally skilled pilots, must if equipped with very fast machines, mtfi must be armed with machine guns. International law must give the Custom officer of the air the power to s^w: down—after due warning any inooffl* ing machine which refuses to give iu signal or to land at th<‘ frontier or coastal control stations. If this is d l ' ! done the policing* of the air will he 3 farce ; it wil' be no use flying up to* marauding machine and hrandisfiing * baton.

Our frontier and tribal wars will k settled not bv the eostlv punitive expeditions of infantry and cavalry cniiN* dit ions of infantry or cavalry, w ll ™ formerly had to march across hnrr.a leagues of dessert or ride through lie tile .stony defiles, hut hy well-equipp® patrols of frontier air-guards, who, c* the outbreak of trouble -r insult rage, will fly to the offending disttei and bomb it into si’mission. Yast flat, areas—such as Siberia, w plains of Central India, or the West of Canada—afford vvoiiieriul sco? for aerial .police duties. Arrests of If breakers will he effected more mP"and with greater secrecy. It to-diydf example, a posse of Canadian West Mounted Police s‘ts. out ton down a. malefactor its .coming islu’i'te ed wide through a’l the forests * prairie lands of tiie n< rth, **“_ j hunted often becomes the hunter. times it takes weete t > track thf " er to his lair. With a f*w rcl in hi* 1 chines, however, the iob would L’ l ., pleted in three or four days pt most, and the offender u.ppr Lend ' brought hack hy air ter his trial. Just as thero are crimes on l nn te sea so there will bo crimes * the air. Smuggling, piracy will probably be tin eldof of tliesc. . there wil 1 lie minor offer"CS agn |n j j laws, such as flvincr on Ih* vrone exhibiting faulty or incomplete. l *® nition marks, failure enrrv nnvica . li"ht« at night, all cf which '.'ill nlis-1. Finally, the taking o f the fir-t : inp- machines wi’l rbviorste fall Id of tiw aerial pclioe.