The Titnes of Wednesday published from its military correspondent an
earnest appeal to the Government to look to our aerial defences before it is too late. We do not think the article in any way exaggerates the disquieting facts. The offensive-defensive by our aircraft has been put out of the question already by our delay ; we are thrown for a long time to come on the defensive in the narrowest sense. It may be that aeroplanes and waterplanes will eventually have a wide enough range to supersede airships altogether, but, as things are, the head and front of the Government's failure is that they have not kept abreast of Germany in what must still be called an indispensable arm of aerial warfare. Germany is said to have twenty-eight airships. Our howitzers would really be useless against these swift craft, and our few and small airships (designed for expeditionary work) utterly out-. classed. The correspondent says that the word has been passed round in Germany that there are to be no more allusions to German airships and their doings. But we know enough already to be convinced that the German airships, which are definitely weapons of attack (not merely of recon- naissance), are a real menace to us. Like must be met by like, and we have at present no means of meeting these Dreadnoughts of the air.
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