When the war opened in 1914, few people expected airplanes to play any kind of combat role. Planes had been invented barely a decade earlier, and most were so small and flimsy they could barely carry a single person, let alone a dangerous weapon. At best, they were expected to be useful for high-altitude reconnaisance but not much more. Instead, airplanes underwent rapid developments and emerged from the war as the military weapon of the future.
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Ace Pilots
As aerial combat grew more frequent, a new class of skilled fighter pilot devleoped. These were the elite pilots who squeezed every ounce of speed and manueverability out of their planes to put themselves in the best positiosn to shoot down enemy aircraft. Pilots who shot down at least five enemy planes were dubbed "aces". To help raise morale both within the military and at home, many air services created special awards to recognize their ace pilots.
The most successful and famous fighter pilot the war - and probably of all wars- was Germany's Manfred Freiherr von Richtofen better known as the Red Baron.
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Observation Balloons
While airplanes were playing rapidly increasing roles in the war, lighter-than-air craft were also advancing. Observation balloons were used by all participants throughout the war. They were even used on seagoing ships, which benefitted from their being able to spot enemy vessels far over the hroizon that were not visible form lower altitudes.
The wireless radio technology used during the war did not lend itself well to voice transmissions. Radio messages could be sent in Morse code but took much longer to transmit than voice communications conveying the same messages. Radio equipment was also too heavy to work well in small aircraft. Because observation balloons were tethered to the ground or to ships, they could easily be wired with telephones. This made it possible for the obervers manning them to speak directly to ground - and ship-based command centers with no delays.
Zeppelins
One of the most frightening developments of the war was the use of huge airships to bomb civilian areas. Most major participants in the war had their own airships, but the unrivaled leader in that technology was Germany's Graf (Count) Ferdinand von Zeppelin, whose name came to be a synonym for giant airshipos.
Watch about Zeppelins here
The Emergence of Bombers
Airplanes started dropping bombs early in the war. Initial efforts, however, were merely individual pilots' crude attempts to drop random bombs by hand while flying reconnaissance missions. The development of real bombers awaited advances in aircraft and engine design that enabled construction of planes large and powerful enough to carry heavy loads over great distances. Germany was the first nation to build a successful heavy bomber, the Gotha. During the summe rof 1917, it began sending squadrons of Gothas on daytime raids against targets in England from bses on the coast of Belgium. As had been the case with the first zeppelin raids two years earlier, the Gotha raids caused public panic.
The Gotha raids began losing their effectiveness as British air defenses improved. A key advance in neutralizing bombers of all types was the development of more effective antiaircraft guns.
Naval Aviation
Aerial warfare was not limited to land-based forces. The navies of most of the nations fighting in the war made pioneering contributions too, especially in the field of airships. In the naval sector of the war, aircraft were invaluable for spotting submarines. Those vessels actually spent a large majority of their time on the surface because they coudl operate underwater on battery power for only limited periods. Britain began employing airships to search for German U-boats in 1915.
The next step in naval aviation was to build ships on which airplanes could both take off and land. In August 1917, an airplane made the first successful landing on the deck of a British ship that had been converted from a cruiser. The modern aircraft carrier was born. Carriers did not play a big role during the last year of the war, but they pointed the way to the future.
- Look at the pages on air war from the Eyewitness book
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