FLIGHT.

went to inspect a new machine and the publicity manager of the constructors gave out some information with the remark : " That is all we are allowed to tell you, but you will find all the rest in (naming a certain foreign paper) of such-and-such a date." Most Government departments are liable to periodical attacks of secrecy fever, but it is a futile proceeding to dash round in a panic shutting the doors of empty stables. The effect is merely irritating to loyal subjects.

DECEMBER 5,

1935.

Commercial Bombers

N Air Ministry representative spoke up the other day at a sitting of the Royal Commission on . the Private Manufacture of and Trading in Arms, and disagreed with the suggestion that a commercial aeroplane could be fitted with bomb-dropping apparatus within eight hours. The exact number of hours which such an operation would take is of minor importance, but it is a very good thing to see some official protest being made now and- again against the statement so often repeated by the uninformed, and so little comprehended by the generality of people, that every civil aeroplane can easily be made into an efficient bomber. Of rnursc, if thr Disarmament Commi- '> , < : < >

succeed in abolishing all air forces, then every civil and commercial aeroplane would become a potential bomber of greater or less efficiency. The ordinary private touring machine, provided that it had the range to reach enemy territory and return, could carry a few bombs, which might be dropped overboard by hand, as was done in the early days of the war by the R.F.C. But to supplement an established and trained air force to any extent which would be worth while by the conversion of civil aircraft would be quite another matter. Such machines would have to run the gauntlet of an organised air defence, for which they would not be well equipped. Then there is the question of defence for the converted bomber. It would not be at all a simple matter to arrange gunners' cockpits in a civil machine so as to provide a good field of fire. A bombing formation by day relies entirely on cross-fire to enable it to fight its way through the defensive fighters to its objective. Even in the case of machines expressly designed as bombers, any one which falls out of the formation becomes an easy prey to the fighters. A night bomber relies more on the darkness than on its guns to get through to its objective, but its crew would not be the happier or the more confident for the knowledge that if attacked they could not count much on their machine guns.

SETTING THE PACE : A welcome stranger, the new Hawker monoplane fighter, being taken for an early test flight by Fr L' P. W. S. Bulman. Powered with a Merlin, the latest liquid-cooled Vee-twelve Rolls-Royce, it uses almost every modern aid to performance. This Flight photograph indicates how carefully its designer, Mr. S. Camm, and his colleagues have considered aerodynamic cleanliness in order to reap the fullest advantage of the immense power output. Doubtless the Merlin does not "over-rev " in attaining the magic 300 m.p.h. mentioned in Parliament by Sir Philip Sasson. Other photographs appear on pages 612 and 613.