On the Western front
the aviation has been screwed up to a very much higher level than on
the Italian line. In Italy it has not become, as it has in France, the
decisive factor. The war on the Carso front in Italy--I say nothing of
the mountain warfare, which is a thing in itself--is in fact still in
the stage that I have called B. It is good warfare well waged, but not
such an intensity of warfare. It has not, as one says of pianos and
voices, the same compass.
This is true in spite of the fact that the Italians along of all the
western powers have adopted a type of aeroplane larger and much more
powerful than anything except the big Russian machines. They are not at
all suitable for any present purpose upon the Italian front, but at
a later stage, when the German is retiring and Archibald no longer
searches the air, they would be invaluable on the western front because
of their enormous bomb or machine gun carrying capacity. "But sufficient
for the day is the swat thereof," as the British public schoolboy says,
and no doubt we shall get them when we have sufficiently felt the need
for them. The big Caproni machines which the Italians possess are of 300
h.p. and will presently be of 500 h.p. One gets up a gangway into them
was one gets into a yacht; they wave a main deck, a forward machine gun
deck and an aft machine gun; one may walk about in them; in addition
to guns and men they carry a very considerable weight of bombs beneath.
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