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six hundred ships assigned to the army areas. There are about twenty-five hundred pilots and thirty-one thousand enlisted men. This force can be doubled within two weeks, and the material is all on hand for that purpose.
For about two years after the War, the French were so stunned by it that comparatively little improvement was made in their means for the tactical and strategical application of an air force or in their technical development. Within the last year and a half, however, a great deal of work has been done as they have tried to form their personnel--both commissioned and enlisted--into an actual arm. During this period, the equipment which they have used was that left over from the War, which supply is now practically exhausted. The personnel has been put into permanent quarters and are down to a regular peace routine--that is, everything has an air of permanency and a regular set method of training and duty.
This year, their aviation will be equipped throughout with new airplanes. These airplanes are of the class developed just as the end of the War and would have been put into production in 1919. Their pursuit aviation will be equipped with Nieuport 29 airplanes having a speed of about 145-150 miles an hour. This is about the fast-
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