World War One flying The Red Baron shot down 80 aircraft before being shot down, A french fighter shot down 75 a British 73 & a Canadian 72, then the list goes right down to many others.
There were minor fights just before World War One, when Italians dropped a small bomb v Ottomans, just dropping it, from a plane, and also a Bulgarian did the same in the Balkan wars, they just did these as virtually spur of the moment.
Germans long Zeppelin 100 metres long, Sausage shape balloons drop bombs on cities, even in Britain, Moving slowly in small packs, with motors, They take off from secret airfields, & are sent over, But part way through the war start to too easily get shot down, They are seen as an extra sign of beastliness, by the Germans, To deep electronic music,
They were the first aerial bombardments in history, of civilians, And first mass bombing of bases, At a time of the Germans being the first to sink ships by submarines, of civilian vessels, I say how it was the first to succeed in other ways too, Yes the first mass scale sinking attempts of enemy ships, and of enemy military vessels, And first mass scale bombing of any kind,
British fighter bomber planes from aircraft carriers were sent and bombed some bases in Germany, In the year 1914, And some shot down zeppelins, in the sky, With some used to attack submarines, but less successfully than depth charges, Blowing enemies up under the sea,
And 100 metre long metal guns too, hit Paris, Firing huge shells, from Germany, Which can barely be hidden among trees, Stored in bases, made to rise by huge machines, & cranes,
And then rise to fire very fast huge shells, killing 250 in Paris, A surprise to this in France, where the shell blasts were hardly believed by some, With some hits in Dover, & S-England's extreme coast, Hitting it's towns, and crossing the 350 feet high white cliffs, with green grass on top, That overlook the very SE of this area,
The limestones making this, with many stones existing on earth, Making red, black orange, yellow, and grey cliffs, of varieties of colour, Neurosis makes the world like a difficult computer game where every step can kill, You or your family, Non neurosis loses that and makes them seem like real lovely exiting and boring,
Killing some by shelling hitting ships in the English Channel, And also towns in NE-England by ships, In WW2 just SE-England saw small shelling on the coasts, Maybe adding more to bombing deaths there,
These couple of super weapons, See them combined kill low 100s, in capital cities alone, Or thereabouts, of which most were Brits & French, & some Poles, And low 1000s, in Britain alone, with all bombing & more in France, Although then again shelling also hit villages & small towns, in France, so add that on, It gets to low 1000s,
Aerial warfare was introduced alongside many other innovations in World War I. Previously wars had been fought on land & at sea, but the advent of aircraft technology allowed a third dimension: a war in the air. (However, reconnaissance ballooning existed long before.) Given the early state of development of aircraft at the time, aerial combat missions played a relatively small part in determining the outcome of the war. Aircraft with canvas-and-wood body & wings were initially used as mobile observation vehicles with the responsibility of mapping enemy positions below. Before the use of head aircraft, Zeppelins & observation balloons were employed for this purpose, each with their own drawback. The problem with the Zeppelin was its slow speed, this made it a prime target for ground gunners. The biggest problem with the observation balloon was that it was stationary (as it was connected by rope to the ground), only allowing observation of a limited area. Observation aircraft solved both difficulties - because of their small size & relative agility, they were more difficult to shoot at from the ground, unlike the Zeppelins. They were also mobile, allowing observation of large sections of the front, unlike observation balloons. Both the Entente & Central powers initially used aircraft only for observation purposes. When rival observation planes crossed paths, the aviators at first exchanged smiles & waves This soon progressed to throwing bricks, grenades, & other objects, even rope, which they hoped would tangle the enemy plane's propeller. Eventually pilots began firing handheld firearms at enemy planesOnce the guns were mounted to the aircraft, the era of air combat began. Like most other technologies during wartime, the aircraft underwent many improvements (though it might be argued that the most drastic changes occurred during the so-called "Golden Age of Flight" in the between-wars period of the 1920s & 1930s). To appreciate the sense of these improvements, compare designs such as the famous late-war Fokker Dr.I with early war aircraft, whose designs were not much different from the original unstable Wright Flyer, which took its first flight over a decade earlier. Aircraft of this early period included the Maurice Farman "Shorthorn" & "Longhorn", D.F.W. BI, Rumpler Taube, B.E. 2a, A.E.G. BII, Bleriot XI, & the Penguin. With limited engine power, aircraft could only afford a certain amount of weight, & therefore were made of mostly canvas & wood. Still-rudimentary engineering, however, meant aircraft might suffer structural failure pulling out of dives, shedding wings or tails. Even with their mechanical problems & technological limitations, observation planes played a critical role in the battles on the ground in 1914, especially in helping the allies halt the German invasion of France. On August 22, 1914, British Captain L.E.O. Charlton & Lieutenant V.H.N. Wadham reported that German General Alexander von Kluck's army was starting to prepare to surround the BEF, contradicting all other intelligence. The British High Command listened to the pilots' report & started a retreat toward Mons--destroying morale but saving the lives of 100,000 soldiers. Later during the First Battle of Marne, observation planes discovered weak points & exposed flanks in the German lines, allowing the allies to take advantage of them. Another major limitation was the early mounting of machine guns, which was awkward due to the position of the propeller. It would seem most natural to place the gun between the pilot & the propeller, so they would be able to aim down its sight as well as service it during a gun jam. However, this gun position presents an obvious problem - the bullets would fly directly into the propeller. Frenchman Roland Garros attempted to solve this problem by attaching metal deflector wedges to the blades of his propeller, which he hoped would guide bullets away. Garros managed to score several kills with his deflector modification, yet it was still an inadequate & dangerous solution, as when Germany tried this, their steel-jacketed bullets shattered the wedges. The French Hotchkiss machine gun (as well as the Lewis gun) used by the Allies used more conventional copper- & brass-jacketed ammunition. One of the remedies at this time was to mount the gun to fire above the propeller. This required the gun to be mounted on the top wing of biplanes & to be propped up & secured by strings on monoplanes. Yet because the gun could not be reached, it could not be serviced during a gun jam, thus making it inoperable. Another solution was the invention of the "pusher" plane, a design which was briefly popular during 1914 to 1915. The pusher design had a propeller positioned in the rear of the plane, behind the pilot. This provided the opportunity to optimally mount the gun, which could now be reloaded & repaired in-flight. The drawback was that pusher planes were not very maneuverable. Later, in 1915, Germany found a breakthrough solution to this problem in the synchronizer gear which allowed the gun to fire through the arc of a spinning propeller without the bullets striking the blades -- essentially by literally allowing the engine to fire the gun. This led in part to their air dominance during this period, which was known as the Fokker Scourge by the allies because of devastating losses inflicted by Fokker aircraft. The Lewis gun, used on many early Allied aircraft, could not be synchronized due to its firing cycle starting with an empty, & open, breech, ready to receive a round. The Maxim-style machine guns used by both the Allies (as the Vickers gun) & Germany (as the LMG 14 Parabellum & LMG 08 Spandau guns) had a firing cycle that started with a bullet already in the breech & the breech closed, which meant the firing of the bullet was the next step in the cycle, making synchronizing those Maxim-style machine guns considerably easier. In 1915, Anthony Fokker designed the synchronizer gear, which turned the tide of war in Germany's favor. This ingenious device mechanically linked the gun to the propeller, allowing it to fire between blades. This was first fitted in the spring of 1915 to the production prototypes of the Fokker Eindecker monoplane, known as the Fokker M.5K/MG (1915-Germany), making it top-of-the-line in design, maneuverability (although the Eindecker used wing warping for roll control), & most importantly, gun placement. Leutnant Kurt Wintgens, on July 1, 1915, scored the earliest known victory for a synchronized gun-equipped fighter with his M.5K/MG over a two-seat Morane Saulnier Parasol on that date near Luneville, France. The result was devastating for the Allied powers, & gave the Germans almost total control of the air. Soon Allied planes were forced to flee for home at the mere sight of German mono-planes. A solution was needed fast. The Fokker E-III's foil came in the form of the Nieuport 11 (1915-France), a biplane with a tractor prop & , as needed, a cowl gun. The key event which allowed the Allies to reverse-engineer the German technology occurred when a German pilot became lost in heavy fog over France. The pilot & plane were captured when it landed, giving the Allies access to its technology. Another plane that contributed to the end of the Fokker E-III's superiority was the British Airco DH-2, a "pusher plane" with the propeller located behind the pilot. The DH-2 suffered from mechanical reliability problems, but was far superior to the Fokker E-III. The Fokker E-III, Airco DH-2, & the Nieuport 11 would be the first in a long line of fighter aircraft used by both sides during the war. Fighter planes were primarily used to shoot down enemy planes, mainly the enemy's two-seat planes used for recon & bombing missions. Because of this, another key role of fighter planes was to protect their own two-seat planes from enemy fighters while they carried out their mission. Fighters were also used to attack ground targets with small loads of bombs & by strafing them with their machine guns.
In April the Allies launched a joint offensive with the British attacking near Arras in Artois, northern France, while the French Nivelle Offensive was launched on the Aisne & the air forces were called on to provide support, predominantly in reconnaissance & artillery spotting. However, the Germans were prepared for the offensive, & were equipped with the new Albatros D-III, which was far superior to any allied fighter planes at the time. The month became known as Bloody April by the Allied air forces. The Royal Flying Corps suffered losses so severe it came close to being annihilated. However, they managed to keep the German Air Force on the defensive, largely preventing them from from using their planes on bombing or reconnaissance missions to assist their troops on the ground. Shortly after "Bloody April", the Allies re-equipped their squadrons with new planes such as the Sopwith Pup, & SE5a which helped tip the balance back in their favor. The Germans responded with new fighters as well, such the Fokker Dr.I but these were countered by the British Sopwith Camel & French SPAD S.XIII. As a result, neither side managed to take a clear technological advantage for the remainder of the war, but eventually the Allies would gain the advantage in numbers & material toward the end of the year. The final year of the war (1918) saw increasing shortages of supplies on the side of the Central Powers. Captured Allied planes were scrounged for every available material, even to the point of draining the lubricants from damaged engines just to keep one more German plane flyable. Manfred von Richthofen, the famed Red Baron credited with around 80 victories, was killed in April, possibly by an Australian anti-aircraft machinegunner (although Royal Air Force pilot Captain Arthur Roy Brown was officially credited), & the leadership of Jagdgeschwader 1 eventually passed to Hermann Göring, future head of Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe. Germany introduced the Fokker D.VII, both loved & loathed to the point that surrender of all surviving examples was specifically ordered by the victorious allies. This year also saw the United States increasingly involved. While American volunteers had been flying in Allied squadrons since the early years of the war, it wasn't until 1918 when all-American squadrons begin patrolling the skies above the trenches. At first, the Americans were largely supplied with second-rate weapons & obsolete planes, such as the Nieuport 28. But as American forces began arriving in large numbers, they received better equipment, including the SPAD S.XIII, one of the best French planes in the war. Though aircraft still functioned as vehicles of observation, increasingly it was used as a weapon in itself. Dog fights erupted in the skies over the front lines - planes went down in flames & heroes were born. From this air-to-air combat, the need grew for better planes & gun armament. Aside from machine guns, air-to-air rockets were also used like the Le Prieur rocket against balloons & airships. This need for improvement was not limited to air-to-air combat. On the ground, methods developed before the war were being used to deter enemy planes from observation & bombing. Anti-aircraft artillery rounds were fired into the air & exploded into clouds of smoke & fragmentation, called archie by the allies, providing enemy aircraft with an obstacle course to fly around. Anti-aircraft artillery defenses were increasingly used around observation balloons, which became frequent targets of enemy fighters equipped with special incendiary bullets. Attacks on balloons were so frequent that observers were given parachutes, enabling them to jump to safety. Ironically, only a few aircrew had the luxury of parachutes, due in part to a mistaken belief they inhibited aggressiveness (and in part to early aircraft being unable to lift their significant weight). As the stalemate developed on the ground, with both sides unable to advance even a few miles without a major battle & thousands of casualties, planes became greatly valued for their role gathering intelligence on enemy positions & bombing the enemy's supplies behind the trench lines. Large planes with a pilot & an observer were used to recon enemy positions & bomb their supply bases. Because they were large & slow, these planes made easy targets for enemy fighter planes. As a result, both sides used fighter aircraft to both attack the enemy's two-seat planes & protect their own while carrying out their missions. While the two-seat bombers & Recon planes were slow & vulnerable, they were not defenseless. Two-seat planes had the advantage of both forward & rear firing guns. Typically, the pilot controlled fixed guns behind the propeller, similar to guns in a fighter plane, while the observer controlled a mounted machine gun that he could aim with a 180 arc at incoming fighters behind the plane. Furthermore, two-seat planes could dive at very high speeds due to their excessive weight, allowing them to put some distance between them & enemy fighters. Also, pursuing a diving two-seater was hazardous for a fighter pilot, as it would place the fighter directly in the rear-gunner's line of fire. Several high scoring aces of the war were shot down by "lowly" two-seaters, including Raoul Lufbery & Robert Little. The first ever aerial bombardment of civilians was during World War I. On January 19, 1915, two German Zeppelins dropped 24 fifty-kilogram high-explosive bombs & ineffective three-kilogram incendiaries on Great Yarmouth, Sheringham, King's Lynn, & the surrounding villages. In all, four people were killed, sixteen injured, & monetary damage was estimated at £7,740, although the public & media reaction were out of proportion to the death toll. There were a further nineteen raids in 1915, in which 37 tons of bombs were dropped, killing 181 people & injuring 455. Raids continued in 1916. London was accidentally bombed in May, & , in July, the Kaiser allowed directed raids against urban centres. There were 23 airship raids in 1916 in which 125 tons of ordnance were dropped, killing 293 people & injuring 691. Gradually British air defenses improved. In 1917 & 1918 there were only eleven Zeppelin raids against England, & the final raid occurred on August 5, 1918, which resulted in the death of KK Peter Strasser, commander of the German Naval Airship Department. By the end of the war, 51 raids had been undertaken, in which 5,806 bombs were dropped, killing 557 people & injuring 1,358. The Zeppelin raids were complemented by the Gothaer bomber, which was the first heavier than air bomber to be used for strategic bombing. It has been argued that the raids were effective far beyond material damage in diverting & hampering wartime production, & diverting twelve squadrons & over 10,000 men to air defenses. The calculations which were performed on the number of dead to the weight of bombs dropped would have a profound effect on the attitudes of the British authorities & population in the interwar years. · Bombers of WWI Manned observation balloons floating high above the trenches were used as stationary reconnaissance points on the front lines, reporting enemy troop positions & directing artillery fire. Balloons commonly had a crew of two personnel equipped with parachutes: upon an enemy air attack on the flammable balloon the balloon crew would parachute to safety. Recognized for their value as observer platforms, Observation balloons were important targets of enemy aircraft. To defend against air attack, they were heavily protected by large concentrations antiaircraft guns & patrolled by friendly aircraft. Blimps & balloons helped contribute to the stalemate of the trench warfare of World War I, & the balloons contributed to air to air combat among the aircraft to defend the skies for air superiority because of their significant reconnaissance value. In order to encourage their pilots to attack enemy balloons whenever they were found, both sides counted downing an enemy balloon as an "air-to-air" kill, with the same value as shooting down an enemy plane. Some pilots became particularly distinguished by their prowess at shooting down enemy balloons. Perhaps the most well known was American ace Frank Luke. 14 of his 18 kills were enemy balloons
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