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the French Air Division - That splendid force of 800 ships. These were so placed that they could act as a reserve either for the American First Army. Think of the difference of a mobile reserve that now moves at the rate of the one hundred miles an hour as distinguished from a reserve of infantry, such as we had in our former wars, that moved at from two to three miles an hour.

Now, a word about German Aviation. Many supposed that, because France, England, and America were against Germany, their production and delivery of aeroplanes and their general efficiency would be much greater. This was no the case, however. The Germans well knew what noise the United States was making about a twenty thousand aeroplane programme. They, therefore, took stock, and decided that, while the Americans could not  make and deliver anything like that number with the system they had adopted, to be safe they, The Germans, would adopt a ten thousand aeroplane programme. This was adopted and carried out by them, while, on our side, the total number of squadrons in our air force, using American planes, was eleven on the day of the Armistice, with a strength of less than two hundred ships for duty; all the rest were French aeroplanes. The Germans adpted types easy to make, easy to transport, quick to set up, and easy to maintain.

A study of our general problem showed a very different state of affairs from that encountered in the Sait Miheil operations. Now we were attacking from a salient instead of against a salient. Our axis of movement was on the line Monfaucon-Romangne, or straight out of our centre. It was quite certain that the enemy would quickly avail himself of these condition and, on the ground, make use of the ridges to our left which ran out from the Argonne Forest, and on our right, the positions radiating from the Meuse River north of Verdun. In a corresponding way, he would attack us in the Air from both flanks, attempting to scatter our aviation,