Viewing page 30 of 203

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

operations, require a new arrangement of supply points. Any application of sea power at a distance of over a couple of thousand miles from its base requires years of preparation and not only millions but billions of dollars expenditure. As naval preparations increase in size and extent, just so much do they become better targets for air attack, and as the utility of the great surface battleship is rapidly drawing to a close, most of the effort expended in large surface naval armaments is largely a waste of energy. 
An air force, on the other hand, can establish itself with greatest ease. An unoccupied field, a stretch of ocean beach, even the crater of a volcano, may be occupied and operated from with a minimum of preparation when compared to the installation of a naval depot or the emplacement of artillery of position. Air forces are easily landed from seacraft. The 1st Bombardment Group landed on and operated from Hatteras Island during the past summer with little preparation. all their supplies including 2000 pound bombs, tracters, gasoline and fuel were landed in three and one-half feet of water. In November a pursuit plane was landed in an open readstead on