Aviation in World War I (Part 3)

1915: The Fokker Scourge

The first purpose-designed fighter aircraft included the British Vickers F.B.5, and machine guns were also fitted to several French types, such as the Morane-Saulnier L and N. Initially the German Air Service lagged behind the Allies in this respect, but this was soon to change dramatically.

In July 1915 the Fokker E.I, the first aircraft to enter service with a "synchronisation gear" which enabled a machine gun to fire through the arc of the propeller without striking its blades, became operational. This gave an important advantage over other contemporary fighter aircraft. This aircraft and its immediate successors, collectively known as the Eindecker (German for "monoplane") – for the first time supplied an effective equivalent to Allied fighters. Two German military aviators, Leutnants Otto Parschau and Kurt Wintgens, worked for the Fokker firm during the spring of 1915, demonstrating the revolutionary feature of the forward-firing synchronised machine gun to the embryonic force of Fliegertruppe pilots of the German Empire.

The first successful engagement involving a synchronised-gun-armed aircraft occurred on the afternoon of July 1, 1915, to the east of Lunéville, France when Leutnant Kurt Wintgens, one of the pilots selected by Fokker to demonstrate the small series of five Eindecker prototype aircraft, forced down a French Morane-Saulnier "Parasol" two seat observation monoplane behind Allied lines with his Fokker M.5K/MG Eindecker production prototype aircraft, carrying the IdFlieg military serial number "E.5/15". Some 200 shots from the synchronised Parabellum MG14 machine gun on Wintgens' aircraft had hit the Gnome Lambda rotary engine of the Morane Parasol, forcing it to land safely in Allied territory.^[17]

By late 1915 the Germans had achieved air superiority, rendering Allied access to the vital intelligence derived from continual aerial reconnaissance more dangerous to acquire. In particular the defencelessness of Allied reconnaissance types was exposed. The first German "ace" pilots, notably Max Immelmann, had begun their careers.

The number of actual Allied casualties involved was for various reasons very small compared with the intensive air fighting of 1917–18. The deployment of the Eindeckers was less than overwhelming: the new type was issued in ones and twos to existing reconnaissance squadrons, and it was to be nearly a year before the Germans were to follow the British in establishing specialist fighter squadrons. The Eindecker was also, in spite of its advanced armament, by no means an outstanding aircraft, being closely based on the pre-war Morane-Saulnier H, although it did feature a steel tubing fuselage framework (a characteristic of all Fokker wartime aircraft designs) instead of the wooden fuselage components of the French aircraft.

Nonetheless, the impact on morale of the fact that the Germans were effectively fighting back in the air created a major scandal in the British parliament and press. The ascendancy of the Eindecker also contributed to the surprise the Germans were able to achieve at the start of the Battle of Verdun because the French reconnaissance aircraft failed to provide their usual cover of the German positions.

Fortunately for the Allies, two new British fighters that were a match for the Fokker, the two-seat F.E.2b and the single-seat D.H.2, were already in production. These were both pushers, and could fire forwards without gun synchronisation. The F.E.2b reached the front in September 1915, and the D.H.2 in the following February. On the French front, the tiny Nieuport 11, a tractor biplane with a forward firing gun mounted on the top wing outside the arc of the propeller, also proved more than a match for the German fighter when it entered service in January 1916. With these new types the Allies re-established air superiority in time for the Battle of the Somme, and the "Fokker Scourge" was over.

The Fokker E.III, Airco DH-2 and Nieuport 11 were the very first in a long line of single seat fighter aircraft used by both sides during the war. Very quickly it became clear the primary role of fighters would be attacking enemy two-seaters, which were becoming increasingly important as sources of reconnaissance and artillery observation, while also escorting and defending friendly two-seaters from enemy fighters. Fighters were also used to attack enemy observation balloons, strafe enemy ground targets, and defend friendly airspace from enemy bombers.

Almost all the fighters in service with both sides, with the exception of the Fokkers' steel-tube fuselaged airframes, continued to use wood as the basic structural material, with fabric-covered wings relying on external wire bracing. However, the first practical all-metal aircraft was produced by Hugo Junkers, who also used a cantilever wing structure with a metal covering. The first flight tests of the initial flight demonstrator of this technology, the Junkers J 1 monoplane, took place at the end of 1915 heralding the future of aircraft structural design.

1916: Verdun and the Somme

Creating new units was easier than producing aircraft to equip them, and training pilots to man them. When the Battle of the Somme started in July 1916, most ordinary RFC squadrons were still equipped with planes that proved easy targets for the Fokker. New types such as the Sopwith 1½ Strutter had to be transferred from production intended for the RNAS. Even more seriously, replacement pilots were being sent to France with pitifully few flying hours.

Nonetheless, air superiority and an "offensive" strategy facilitated the greatly increased involvement of the RFC in the battle itself, in what was known at the time as "trench strafing" – in modern terms, close support. For the rest of the war, this became a regular routine, with both attacking and defending infantry in a land battle being constantly liable to attack by machine guns and light bombs from the air. At this time, counter fire from the ground was far less effective than it became later, when the necessary techniques of deflection shooting had been mastered.

The first step towards specialist fighter-only aviation units within the German military was the establishment of the so-called Kampfeinsitzer Kommando (single-seat battle unit, abbreviated as "KEK") formations by Inspektor-Major Friedrich Stempel in February 1916. These were based around Eindeckers and other new fighter designs emerging, like the Pfalz E-series monoplanes, that were being detached from their former Feldflieger Abteilung units during the winter of 1915–16 and brought together in pairs and quartets at particularly strategic locations, as "KEK" units were formed at Habsheim, Vaux, Avillers, Jametz, and Cunel, as well as other strategic locations along the Western Front to act as Luftwachtdienst (aerial guard force) units, consisting only of fighters.^[18] In a pioneering move in March 1916, German master aerial tactician Oswald Boelcke came up with the idea of having "forward observers" located close to the front lines to spot Allied aircraft approaching the front, to avoid wear and tear on the trio of Fokker Eindecker scout aircraft he had based with his own "KEK" unit based at Sivry-sur-Meuse,^[19] just north of Verdun. By April 1916, the air superiority established by the Eindecker pilots and maintained by their use within the KEK formations had long evaporated as the Halberstadt D.II began to be phased in as Germany's first biplane fighter design, with the first Fokker D-series biplane fighters joining the Halberstadts, and a target was set to establish 37 new squadrons in the next 12 months – entirely equipped with single seat fighters, and manned by specially selected and trained pilots, to counter the Allied fighter squadrons already experiencing considerable success, as operated by the Royal Flying Corps and the French Aéronautique Militaire. The small numbers of questionably built Fokker D.IIIs posted to the Front pioneered the mounting of twin lMG 08s before 1916's end, as the building numbers of the similarly armed, and much more formidable new twin-gun Albatros D.Is were well on the way to establishing the German air superiority marking the first half of 1917.

Allied air superiority was maintained during the height of both battles, and the increased effectiveness of Allied air activity proved disturbing to the German Army's top-level Oberste Heeresleitung command staff.^[20] A complete reorganisation of the Fliegertruppen des deutschen Kaiserreiches into what became officially known as the Luftstreitkräfte followed and had generally been completed by October 1916. This reorganisation eventually produced the German strategic bombing squadrons that were to produce such consternation in England in 1917 and 1918, and the specialist close support squadrons (Schlachtstaffeln) that gave the British infantry such trouble at Cambrai and during the German spring offensive of 1918. Its most famous and dramatic effect, however, involved the raising of specialist fighter squadrons or Jagdstaffeln – a full year after similar units had become part of the RFC and the French Aéronautique Militaire. Initially these units were equipped with the Halberstadt D.II (Germany's first biplane fighter), the Fokker D.I and D.II, along with the last few surviving Eindeckers, all three biplane design types using a single lMG 08, before the Fokker D.III and Albatros D.I twin-gun types arrived at the Front.