Three Dimensional Infantry
The successful firing of an atomic shell from an American gun with a range of twenty miles marks a major development in the arts of war. Missiles of this formidable kind will, it is to be hoped, act as a deterrent to aggression; but they cannot, ironically enough, solve any of the military problems with which the armies of the free world are grappling in Korea, Indo-China and Malaya, for in those theatres there are no targets sufficiently important for them to engage. More relevant to our immediate requirements on Asiatic battle-fields has been this week's striking demonstration, in Johore, of the operational capabilities of the helicopter, which have never before undergone so ambitious a test on active service. These machines, which can land, pick up five fully equipped men and take off again in a matter of seconds, are being used in an attempt, made by a brigade comprising the East Yorkshires and two Gurkha battalions with police co-operation, to comb some sixty square miles of dense and swampy jungle, in which the local Communist committee and its bodyguard is known to be hiding. The helicopters, manned by pilots of the Royal Navy and the R.A.F., make possible the rapid and oppor- tunist redeployment of sub-units taking part in the search and lessen the physical strain upon the troops as well, of course, as greatly increasing the range and the unpredictableness of their movements. If the operation is successful it is hoped that the Communist hold on Johore will be decisively broken; and even if some of the' wanted men slip through a net which still, inevitably, has a wide mesh, it is impossible to underrate the importance of the first full-scale test of a technique which in effect adds a third dimension to jungle warfare.
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