Cocky fellows claiming impossible achievements. What
proof can they give of their preposterous tales? They only go into the
air service because they haven't the pluck to serve in the infantry."
That was prejudice. The German losses were proof enough of our men's
fighting skill and strength, and German prisoners and German letters
confirmed all their claims. But we were dishonest in our reckoning
from first to last, and the British public was hoodwinked about our
losses. "Three of our machines are missing." "Six of our machines are
missing." Yes, but what about the machines which crashed in No Man's
Land and behind our lines? They were not missing, but destroyed, and
the boys who had flown in them were dead or broken.
To the end of the war those aviators of ours searched the air for
their adventures, fought often against overwhelming numbers, killed
the German champions in single combat or in tourneys in the sky, and
let down tons of high explosives which caused great death and
widespread destruction; and in this work they died like flies, and one
boy's life--one of those laughing, fatalistic, intensely living boys--
was of no more account in the general sum of slaughter than a summer
midge, except as one little unit in the Armies of the Air.
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