The possible
chances of being hit by terrestrial gunfire are infinitesimally small.
This does not take into account the vast opportunities that a
dirigible has for night attacks or the possibility of hiding among the
clouds. The X 15, sailing over London, could drop explosives down and
create terrible havoc. They don't have to aim. They are not like
aviators trying to drop a bomb on the deck of a warship. They simply
dump overboard some of the new explosive of the German Government,
these new chemicals having the property of setting on fire anything
that they hit, and they sail on. They do not have to worry about
hitting the mark. Consider the size of their target. They are simply
throwing something at the City of London. If they do not hit
Buckingham Palace they are apt to hit Knightsbridge. And remember
that whatever one of the new German explosives strikes, conflagration
begins.
A?«roplanes, biplanes, monoplanes, and the other innumerable host of
small craft so often quoted as a possible counterdefense against the
Zeppelin, are overrated, and are in any case theoretical. The German
authorities have made vast and exhaustive trials in these matters.
The strenuous efforts on the part of this Empire to increase its
dirigible fleet is to my way of thinking answer enough. The German
General Staff at Berlin tries out more thoroughly than any nation in
the world every new device of warfare.
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