Command of the Air The air display at Hendon last
Saturday was the most imposing numerically ever arranged in this country. The programme went through as intended without a hitch, and no accident of any kind marred the proceedings. Such occasions provide no basis for a precise judgement on the quality of the airmanship displayed, and it would be too much to expect that the average of attainment among the pilots of the rapidly enlarged force as a whole can have been kept quite to the high standard achieved when the air force was small and every pilot was a picked man. But when quality and quantity together are taken into account—and there is every reason to believe that quality has surpassed reasonable expec- tations no less than quantity—the general result must be regarded as distinctly satisfactory. The expansion of the force, which six months ago looked like being well behind programme, is in fact pulling up to it, and deliveries of air- craft are said to be now exceeding the power of the Air Force to absorb them. That may well be, for it takes longer to make a pilot than to make an aeroplane. Rearmament is a deplorable expedient, from which at this moment there is no escape, but the struggle for Bilbao throws sinister emphasis on the hopelessness of the situation of a belligerent against an aggressor with command of the air. Our air force is still far below those of Russia, France, Germany and Italy numeri- cally, but the gap is at least being diminished and with satis- factory rapidity.
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