n, such as chemical
and bacterial attack on great industrial and political centres. Various
proposals, such as the control of the air effort, service and civil, of
all countries by the League of Nations, and even the complete
elimination of aviation, have been put forward as a means of avoiding
the horrors of aerial warfare and its appurtenances, but they are
untenable, and any power wishing and able to sweep them aside will
undoubtedly do so.

A future war, as I see it, will begin something after this manner,
provided either side possesses large air forces. Huge day and night
bombers will assemble at the declaration of war to penetrate into the
enemy's country for the attack of his centres of population, his
mobilization zones, his arsenals, harbours, strategic railways, shipping
and rolling stock. Corps and Army squadrons will concentrate in
formation to accompany the armies to the front; reconnaissance and
fighting patrols will scatter in all directions from coastal air bases
to discover the enemy's concentrations and cover our own; the fleet,
whatever its nature, will emerge with its complement of reconnaissance
and protective machines and torpedo aircraft for direct action against
the enemy's fleet. A few fighting defence units will remain behind.

But it must not be imagined that these functions will be carried out
unopposed. Local battles in the air will occur between fighting machines
for the protection of specialized machines, while the main air forces in
large formations will concentrate independently to produce, if possible,
a shattering blow on the enemy and obtain from the outset a supremacy in
the air comparable to our supremacy on the sea in the last war.

In mobilization the time factor is all-important. Our national history
has been one of extraordinary good fortune in this respect, but the
margin allowable for luck is becoming very narrow and, whereas in 1914
it was some twenty days between the declaration of war and the exchange
of the first shots, in the next war the air battle may be joined within
as many hours, and an air attack launched almost simultaneously with the
declaration of war. In modern war the mobilization period tends to
shorten, and every effort will be made towards its further reduction,
since mobilizing armies are particularly vulnerable from air attack.

CIVIL AVIATION AS A FACTOR IN NATIONAL SECURITY.

The picture I have drawn may appear highly coloured for the reason that