National Affairs: Great Green Snake

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ARMY & NAVY Last week a great olive-green snake with a hiss-like thunder hovered in the skies over the eastern half of the U. S. Sometimes it strung out in a disjointed line 20 mi. long. Sometimes it coiled in angles and echelons over cities. In the evenings it disintegrated, scattered down to rest for the night. For the first time, the Army had mustered its entire air strength for maneuvers. The 672 green-bodied, yellow-winged planes—205 pursuit, 335 observation, 51 attack, 36 bombardment, 45 transport—composed the greatest peacetime concentration of aircraft in U. S. history.

Segments of the green snake came from Mitchel Field, N. Y., from Kelly Field and Fort Crockett in Texas, from Crissy and Rockwell Fields in California, from all over the country. When the armada assembled at Wright and Fairfield Fields in Dayton, it became a dire aerial weapon capable of firing 2,000,000 shots a minute or loosing 100,000 Ib. of bombs. Its title: The First Provisional Air Division.

First problem of the maneuver was its concentration which took place without serious mishap, in spite of dirty flying weather. Some bombers from the West were held up, and at Boiling Field (Washington, D. C.) the pilots watched a grey sky, chafed at delay. Finally three planes started off. An hour later two of them were forced back by the weather. The other plane was the only one to get through to Dayton from Boiling Field that day. It was piloted by baldheaded, pipe-smoking Brigadier General Benjamin Delahauf ("Benny") Foulois,* 51-year-old Assistant Chief of Air Corps, senior airman in point of service, commander of this year's maneuvers.

In 1898 Benny Foulois rode his bicycle into New York from Washington, Conn. He wanted to join the Navy. Finding no Navy recruiting station, unable to get into the merchant marine, he enlisted in the Engineer Corps. He rose from the ranks, was a Signal Corps lieutenant in 1908. The first Army man to be taught to fly by Orville Wright, he was assigned to operate the Army's first plane, which he flew after 90 minutes of instruction. During the War he was chief of the A. E. F. air service.

Over Dayton, birthplace of heavier-than-air craft, General Foulois and his staff of 150 watched the first demonstration of the three-week maneuvers. Flight after flight took the air, darkening the sky, drowning the city's traffic roar. For the first time since the War militia planes, 99 of them from 18 States, and cadets from Kelly Field, took part in regular Army formations. Main event of the first day was a contest for honor position during the maneuvers between the 95th squadron, 20th Pursuit Group (Rockwell Field), and the 36th squadron, First Pursuit Group (Selfridge Field). The California squadron, led by Captain Frank O. Hunter (War ace credited with nine planes), beat its rival under Captain Victor Strahm (War ace credited with five planes) in a smooth tactical and acrobatic operation.