IBS TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION A. 



accomplished. It was certaiii'ly not because sucli a committee would not work. 

 Everybody was most willing, with proper notice, to attend such meetings as 

 were involved, and to take any amount of personal trouble ; moreover, the 

 scheme was such as to provide that there should always be a nucleus of members 

 in London to consult and act in any emergency. 



I may briefly refer to one or two examples of the chaos which prevailed 

 and the attempts that were made to cope with it. Very soon after the formation 

 of the first Kitchener Army the organisation of the different corps apparently 

 became a source of anxiety to the War Office. It began to be seen that officers 

 in sufficient numbers could not possibly be obtained by the usual channels, so 

 the expedient (a poor one by itself) wae hit upon of placing the nominatione 

 to commissions in one at least of the two great scientific corps of the Army — 

 the Royal Engineers — in the hands of the presidents of certain technical Institu- 

 tions which have their headquarters in London. These gentlemen, with the help 

 of the official secretaries, no doubt did the best they could, but a very regrettable, 

 though perfectly natural, amount of strong feeling weis evoked among the young 

 scientifically educated men in the provinces, who were keenly anxious to join 

 this corps. The Engineers, I may hardly say, is no refuge for men who are 

 in the least Concerned about their personal safety, for the percentage of casual- 

 ties among Engineers on active service was notably higher than in the regiments 

 of the line. Over and over again young engineers came to me, and complained 

 that under the arrangements made they had no chance of obtaining commis- 

 sions, or of qualifying as cadets, and begged me to write to the authorities. 

 Of course, young graduate engineers do not as a rule join Societies such as the 

 Institution of Civil, Mechanical, or Electricai Engineers, until they have made 

 their way to some little extent, and begun to earn a little money. 



The procedure I have indicated had in time to be relaxed, but such a Central 

 Committee as I suggested, with antennae stretching out to the educational and 

 technical centres of the country would, I am sure, have recruited the Engineers 

 quickly with the best possible material for officers to be found in the country, to 

 the satisfaction of all concerned. It may be said that full information regarding 

 every man in the country was in the hands of the authorities. In a sense this 

 was true ; the information existed in millions of returns, and thousands of 

 pigeon-holes, but no attempt was made, or could be made, by office staffs in 

 London, enormous as these quickly became, to digest and utilise it. 



A large number of engineers and physicists and many others of mechanical 

 skill and aptitudes found congenial occupation in the Royal Naval Air Service 

 and the Royal Flying Corps ; but even there, where things could be better done, 

 since a new force had to be brought into existence, arrangements were to a 

 considerable extent haphazard and ill thought out. Excel'lent self-sacrificing 

 service was rendered by many, who risked and gave their lives, and of what 

 was done we may. well be proud. But from a .scientific point of view there is 

 room for great improvement. The, as I think, hasty and ill-considered amal- 

 gamation of these two branches of the Air Service, in which naval traditions 

 were sacrified to those of the War Office, which deserved no such deference, 

 will certainly have to be undone in the near future, or very greatly transformed. 

 To anyone who considers the possibilities and probabilities of warfare in the 

 future, it appears clear that this country will have to depend more and more 

 upon its Navy, and that an Air Service Corps will be the companion of every 

 division of our Fleet, with landings on the warships. Thus a new and highly 

 scientific service, which will have to be to a great extent naval, is certain to be 

 brought into existence. 



Well, then, to return for a moment to my proposal to the Royal Society, why 

 should the organisation which I suggested in 1915 not be established now ? 1 

 wish all success to the League of Nations, but we ehall prove ourselves even 

 greater fools than we have been in the past if we do not use all possible 

 means to prepare ourselves against eventualities. One attempt by our enemies 

 outside our own borders to hold us to ransom has failed. Can we be so sure 

 that no other attempt will ever be made, or that no cnsits hcUi between our- 

 selves and another great nation will ever arise? This, I notice, is beginning to 

 be assumed even in the midst of the welter of confusion and unrest that exists, 

 and, among others, by just the very people who used to teach that the possibility 

 of war was a great illusion. 



