6 DECEMBER 1940, Page 3

An Air - Marshal on Aviation In a remarkable address delivered before

the Royal Empire Society on Tuesday Air-Marshal Sir Philip Joubert, so well and so favourably known to radio listeners, expressed himself with vigour on the essential senselessness of air-warfare. Where, he asked, were we tending? Was the future always to be like this? He saw two alternatives after this war, to abolish aviation altogether (Lord Trenchard was once said to have expressed regret that flying had ever been invented) or to see that it was never put to its present uses again. Without going into any detail the Air-Marshal seemed to advocate some form of international control of aviation. If that was, in fact, his meaning, and whether he would have the control exercised by a league of the victorious democracies or by a more universal body, his speech gives powerful support to . those who, like Lord Cecil, see no hope except in abolishing national military aviation and tolerating only an international air-force.