Welcome back!
If you've read our first 20th century snapshot about the advent of tanks, you just might be even more surprised this time. In World War I , tanks definitely changed the landscape of battlefield, but airplanes invented an entirely new battlefield. Just imagine, in centuries of warfare before 20th century, soldiers rarely had to fear anything except from enemy in front of them. The appearance of airplanes changed all that. In just a couple of years, technology allowed strategists to see the entire battlefield at once, attack enemies from above and project power at incredible distances.
But let's backtrack a bit to where this story begins. It's early 20th century, Wright brothers conducted their maiden flight with nothing more then a prototype featuring paper wings and wooden fuselage. These few dozen meters flown was enough to prove the concept of flight is possible. Internal combustion engines already existed, so it was a matter of time before someone turns these things into an actual useable aircraft. And with Great conflict looming, no one spared any investment in making this work as soon as possible. That explains why various prototypes and airplane models appeared everywhere, right, left and center. In absence of modern computers and simulations, only way forward was to innovate quickly, bravely and try multiple ideas at the same time. This mindset spawned amazing machines, but also many horrendeous failures and plain ridiculous projects.
WHAT DID PLANNERS WANT?
In short, only initial use of airplanes that anyone anticipated was a scout role. Basically, strategists imagined an airplane will replace a horseman scout by being faster and by having better overview of the situation from the air. Therefore, early efforts were aimed at reliability of planes and ways to equip it with cameras. Unlike tank, in case of technical failure, you couldn't simply abandon the airplane and leave it be, especially if you were few kilometers high. Another thing to mention is that at the start of World War I, airplanes actually had competition – blimps. They existed before them and were used for observing the battlefield and occassional (usually unsuccessful) smaller bombings. Many expected blimps to be further evolved and take on more important role in combat. However, already initial prototypes of airplanes were better suited for aeriel surveillance – they were faster, harder to hit and required less maintenance. So they meant a pretty fast death of blimps. But, did anyone anticipated airplanes to become a real combat machine? Probably not…
WHAT HAPPENED TO INITIAL IDEA?
Well, pretty much expected chain of events – once first army started using planes for scouting with great success, others followed. Soon skies were buzzing with all sorts of surveillance aircraft with everybody trying to understand and see what their enemy is up to. This had an impact on military operations in many instances. So the race started to find a way to remove your enemy's eyes in the sky. First instance of aerial combat took place with one pilot ramming the enemy plane and destroying both in the process. That not being a very cost effective way to deal with enemy aircraft, airplanes were equipped with weapons. This was the first step to a modern fighter plane. Technical obstacles were still huge and engineers still had a mountain to climb, but the picture of what combat airplane could be was starting to be clear…
RAPID ITERATION MADNESS
Desperate to find any edge in static gruesome battlefields of World war I, airplane designers came up with the craziest of ideas. They really haven't left any stones unturned. Airplane engines were made bigger and stronger, they tried mounting it in the front (tractor airplanes), then at the back (pusher airplanes). They used two wings (biplanes), then three wings (triplanes), then a single wing concept. They made fuselage from wood and cloth, then tried metal once engines could support the extra weight. And armament… ideas here were all over the place. Initially they mounted a single machinegun at the rear of the aircraft. But that required a rear gunner adding extra weight. Next machineguns appeared on top of upper wing on biplanes allowing pilots to both shoot, reload and fly the plane. How successful this multitasking in the middle of aerial combat was is clear because this idea was soon abandoned.
Next idea was mounting two machineguns in front of the pilot making all these tasks easier, but then he'd be shooting right through the propeller. In that case this pilot was often biggest danger to himself, not to the enemy. Engineers tried to design an armored propeller blades to prevent damage, but deflected bullets often ended up in the plane engine causing fatal failures.
Final breakthrough came with synchronyzed machineguns that were able to shoot directly through propeller blades without damaging it. And these planes became first seriously useable combat machines. Stage was set for the appearance of first aerial legends good enough to make history using these new weapons…
AERIAL BATTLES
Once airplanes became serious machines, new battle arena appeared. First pilots were regarded in somewhat romantic way. Unlike foot soldiers in countless dirty trenches across Europe, pilots were seen as modern knights. They bravely charged at their enemies in the clean skies and above thousands of spectators looking at them from their cold, wet bunkers. Anyone who got more then 5 aerial wins became an ace, and every army was immensly proud of their aces. One of the biggest legends was Manfred von Richthofen, better known as Red Baron, with 80 aerial wins. Since planes of that era were relatively slow and loud, and anti aircraft weapons weren't big of a threat, there was no point in hiding airplanes. So they were often painted in bright cheerful colours. That made them even more „cool“ in the eyes of many people.
Interesting thing here is how advantage changed hands often during Great war. With airplanes being developed incredibly fast, it was easy to gain dramatic advantage with only a single aircraft having some technical novelty, be it in weapons, or greater agility or something else. Upper hand switched almost every year throughout the entire conflict.
HELL FROM ABOVE
As you can already guess, as soon as airplanes prove their worth, strategists in every existing army immediately started looking for new ways to exploit this incredible machines. Why just shooting down other planes? If they are literally unchallenged by ground troops, why not using them to inflict damage against helpless units on the ground? And just like that an idea of bomber was born. Granted, imaginative pilots already came to the same idea earlier, but their efforts were more a funny improvisation then a serious danger. In early years of the war, pilots (and gunners in some cases), armed themselves for a „bombing runs“. In these years it meant picking up some stones, bricks, sharp darts or possibly a few bombs. That was then simply thrown manually at enemy troops below. Inflicted damage was almost non existant, but the idea remained alive. Engineers got to work designing specific types of airplanes for bombing missions. Lots of bombs meant much heavier planes, that meant bigger engines and more fuel was needed. First bomber planes arrived at the battlefield, but without targeting equipment hitting anything from far above was mostly down to luck. In First world war it meant bombers won't have much of an impact, but as we all know, that was just a stepping stone to what will come couple of decades later when huge aerial bomber armadas layed waste to entire cities…
WELCOME TO AIRFORCE
After only a few years of World War I, airplanes shown what they can do, and even a blind man couldn't miss that lesson. Aerial units became so important that specialized planes were developed (surveilance, fighter and bomber planes), organized into squadrons and entire field of aerial combat tactics was created. In turn, this soon led to the creation of separate branch of military – the Airforce. In World war II this will prove its worth as air power was enough to break the back of the enemy and turn the entire war in another direction. In modern times, it became even more important because no successful battle can be won without gaining the air superiority first.
Until next time!
PHOTO SOURCES:
FOKKER_EI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_in_World_War_I
FOKKER DR1: https://warhawkairmuseum.org/explore/aviation-collection/the-blue-max/
SOPWITH CAMEL: https://www.baesystems.com/en/heritage/sopwith-camel
BREGUET BG5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Br%C3%A9guet_5
EARLY BOMBER: https://www.iwm.org.uk/learning/resources/what-impact-did-the-first-world-war-have-on-aircraft-and-aerial-warfare
EARLY BOMBING PHOTO: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/media/photo/aerial-bomb-aiming-1916