Gift shop business plan January 17, It is generally accepted that the gift business is one of the simplest types of small business. Individual local craftsmen, artists, potters, photographers, handicraft and toy makers produce their products in small quantities and sell them personally or through small shops to tourists, children, lovers of the exotic and original gifts. In fact, this is an outdated idea, as the modern souvenir business is distinguished by the introduction of the latest technologies, fresh and unique designs, the use of composite materials, innovative trading methods, including online trading, delivery and customer service. With the growth of the well-being of the population, its interest in souvenirs, memorable gifts, attributes of local specifics, clothes, historical objects, personalities, etc. is growing. At the same time, different dynamics are observed in the adjoining segments of this vast market: , luxury, mass market, lower price segment. For Russian specifics, a good prerequisite for opening a souvenir shop is a slight reduction in outbound tourism and the concentration of Russians on domestic recreation in its various manifestations - car travel, trips to cities and small towns of the country, sports tourism when large masses of fans follow their team or athlete .

This service allows you to solve all three tasks at the same time, allowing you to attract visitors from different sources and any device. New channels to attract traffic appear all the time, and those entrepreneurs who will be among the first to use them will be able to gain an unconditional advantage over competitors. Using this service will be especially useful for small businesses in the regions. In addition, it is also a way to receive feedback from the target audience, because users, for example, can express their opinion about the company using ratings and reviews. Here's what it looks like: The ability to keep up-to-date information about the company's work is equally important. We are talking about the address and working hours, contact phone numbers, photos, etc.

During the First World War, many technical developments of the last century were used. It was at this time that new types of weapons were formed that had never been used in war before. In particular, the aircraft of the First World War became such weapons. At the beginning of the 20th century, no one thought that aircraft would be used as weapons. However, less than 5 years later, the first orders for the construction of airliners for the army began to arrive.

At the time of mid-1914, there were more than 700 aircraft in the armed forces of European countries. In the Russian Federation at that time there were about 250 airliners. In France there are more than 200, and in Germany there are about 300.

Initially, aircraft were used in the war for reconnaissance purposes. For the first time, an airliner was used by the Italians to strike at the enemy during the war with Turkey. At that time, these were primitive bombs that were manually dropped from the cockpit by pilots. Despite the beginning of the use of airliners for bombing, by the beginning of the war, almost no one knew about the real significance of airliners at the front.

Even at the beginning of hostilities, the main tasks of such aircraft were communications support and reconnaissance. At this time, the advantages of aerial reconnaissance over conventional cavalry became apparent. The main advantage was the high speed of the aircraft. The cavalry detachment spent several days on a 100-kilometer raid. The aircraft needed only a few hours to do this. To maintain communication and quickly transmit information, pilots threw notes with messages on the ground. Aerial photography began to be used for reconnaissance. Such photos were intended for a more detailed study of the territories. The Russian Federation was ahead of other countries in this matter. Half-film cameras were used here, while all other states used cassette cameras.

If at the beginning of the 20th century there was no question of the serious use of aircraft as a weapon, then over time, of course, they came to this idea. After several experiments, it became clear that the installation of weapons on airliners is not ineffective, as it seemed before. Machine guns, bombs, metal arrows appeared in the arsenal of airplanes. There were no bomb racks in the airliners of that time. Armament was located directly in the cockpit. Aircraft at this time did not differ in combat purpose. There were either exclusively reconnaissance aircraft or light bombers. Training aircraft also constituted a separate category.

Fokker DR1 Triplane

Variety of aircraft

In aviation during the First World War, various aircraft were present. In hostilities, all the airliners that this or that country had were used. In Germany, even private German aircraft were given away for military purposes. In particular, the Taube monoplane was used in hostilities. In those days it was a very famous aircraft. From this airplane the first bombs were dropped in the capital of France.

The relatively simple process of developing and creating aircraft, which existed at the beginning of the 20th century, made it possible to create a huge number of different airliners. The developers quickly realized that the specific design of the aircraft greatly affects its combat capabilities. In 1913, the world's first aircraft was designed, which was intended specifically for the armed forces. Its difference was a custom design. The wing was located above the fuselage. This provided a good overview for the crew.

Russia

In the Russian Federation, there were very few airliners developed by local specialists at that time. Of the front-line, it is worth mentioning the Russian aircraft of the First World War, which were called "Swan". This airliner was designed similar to the Albatros aircraft used in reconnaissance. Also in the Russian Federation used aircraft that were designed in Odessa. There were several hundred of them. In addition, several hundred Lebed airplanes were created. At that time, there were already several hundred French airliners in Russia, which formed the basis of Russian aviation.

France

At the beginning of the war, from the famous airliners Voisin and Farman in France created a whole division of bombers. On board these aircraft could take with them more than 200 kg of bombs. Some modifications of the bombers were equipped with guns. However, such weapons were rarely used in aircraft in those years. These airliners differed structurally from the prevailing majority of aircraft of that time. Its main difference was the rear engine. In such aircraft, the propeller was of the pusher type, not the puller type.

In 1917, a decree was issued in France, according to which it was forbidden to build and design such aircraft. After the first applications, a great disadvantage of these aircraft was discovered. The main disadvantage was that the pilot was not able to shoot at the enemy if he was behind. This made these aircraft easy prey for opponents in air combat. These two types of airliners were replaced by improved Breguet 14 models. These were, if not the best aircraft of the First World War, then one of the best in France. In these airliners, a part of the structure that was made of wood in previous models was made from thin but strong aluminum elements. And the crew seats were made armored.

Britannia

The best British military aircraft were the so-called De Havillands. Initially, such airliners of the 4th series took part in hostilities. But gradually their production improved. This model has been developed up to the 9th series. During the development process, specialists paid attention to such an aspect as the interaction of crew members during the flight. If the first models had a distance of about 1 m between the cockpit and the observer, then in the latest models this distance was significantly reduced, since there was no on-board communication at that time. These aircraft had the most powerful engines at the time. They also featured a higher combat load compared to other single-engine aircraft of the time. The Soviet R-1 aircraft, which was used for reconnaissance, was a copy of the latest De Haviland model.

FIRST AIR BATTLE (1914)

Aviation entered World War I unarmed. Airplanes were mainly engaged in aerial reconnaissance, less often - bombing (moreover, the pilots dropped ordinary hand grenades, steel arrows, and sometimes small-caliber artillery shells on the enemy). Naturally, the "bombing" of 1914 did not actually cause any harm to the enemy (except for the panic that this new, flying type of military equipment caused among the infantry and cavalry). However, the role of aircraft in detecting the movements of enemy troops turned out to be so great that there was an urgent need to destroy reconnaissance aircraft. This need gave rise to air combat.

The designers and pilots of the warring countries began work on the creation of weapons for airplanes. What they just didn’t come up with: saws tied to the tail of the aircraft, with which they were going to rip the skin of airplanes and stratospheric balloons, cat hooks on a cable, with which they intended to tear off the wings on an enemy aircraft ... It makes no sense to list here all these stillborn developments, attempts to use which today look anecdotal . The most radical way to destroy an air enemy turned out to be a ram - a deliberate collision of aircraft, causing the destruction of the structure and the death of airplanes (as a rule - both!).

The ancestor of air combat can be considered a Russian pilot Petra NESTEROVA. On August 26, 1914, over the city of Zholkev, he shot down an Austrian airplane that was conducting reconnaissance of Russian troops with a ramming blow. However, during this blow, the engine came off on Moran Nesterov, and the hero died. The ram turned out to be a mutually dangerous weapon, a weapon that could not be used constantly.

Therefore, at first, the pilots of the opposing sides, when meeting, fired at each other from revolvers, then rifles and machine guns mounted on the sides of the cockpits went into action. But the probability of hitting the enemy with such weapons was very low, besides, rifles and machine guns could only be used on clumsy two-seater vehicles. For a successful air battle, it was necessary to create a light, maneuverable single-seat aircraft, the machine guns of which would be aimed at the target with the entire hull. However, the propeller interfered with the installation of machine guns on the nose of the aircraft - bullets would inevitably shoot off its blades. It was not until the next year that this problem was solved.

this is how the armament problem was solved on the first airplanes

Weapons used in air battles by aviators from different countries in 1914 - early 1915.

self-loading pistol Browning mod. 1903 (used by aviators of all countries)

self-loading pistol Mauser S.96 (used by aviators of all countries)

Rifle Mauser arr. 1898 (used by German aviators)

carbine Lebel arr. 1907 (used by French aviators)

Mosin rifle arr. 1891 (used by Russian aviators)

Lewis light machine gun (used by Entente aviators)

the world's first self-loading rifle of the Mexican Mondragon arr. 1907 (used by German aviators)

machine gun (light machine gun) Madsen arr. 1902 (used by Russian aviators)

The appearance of the first fighters
in the air units of the warring parties in 1915

IN MARCH

In 1915, pilots from all countries of the world entered almost unarmed: indiscriminate firing at the enemy from personal revolvers or cavalry carbines did not bring noticeable results; two-seat airplanes equipped with pivot machine guns were too heavy and slow for successful air combat. Pilots seeking to destroy the enemy were looking for new ways to destroy enemy aircraft. It became clear to everyone that in order to defeat the enemy, a rapid-fire weapon was needed - a machine gun; moreover, this weapon must be rigidly fixed on the airplane so as not to distract the pilot from controlling the aircraft.

The first attempts to arm light maneuverable vehicles with machine guns were made even before the creation of the synchronizer, at the turn of 1914-1915. For example, in the UK, improvised machine gun mounts were mounted on Bristol Scout light aircraft; however, in order not to shoot off the propeller blades, these machine guns were installed at an angle of 40-45 degrees to the left or right of the cockpit, which made aimed fire almost unrealistic. It became more and more obvious that the machine gun should look exactly ahead so that it could be aimed at the target with the entire body of the aircraft; but this was impossible to implement because of the danger of shooting off the propeller blades, which would lead to the death of the aircraft.

British airplane Bristol "Scout" with a machine gun on the port side, fixed at an angle of 40 degrees away from the direct course
Engine: Gnome (80 hp), speed: 150 km/h, armament: 1 unsynchronized machine gun "Lewis"

IN APRIL

The French were the first to succeed in creating a real fighter. Tired of constantly failing in senseless attacks on enemy aircraft with a small revolver, pilot Roland Garro came to the conclusion that in order to hit a target, he needed a machine gun rigidly mounted on the hood of the aircraft - so that it could be aimed at the target with the entire body of the aircraft without being distracted in the attack for separate control of the machine and aiming at the enemy from a mobile weapon. However, Garro, like other pilots of all the fighting countries, was faced with an insoluble task: how to fire from a bow machine gun without firing off his own propeller blades? And then Garro turned to aircraft designer Raymond Saulnier, who offered the pilot a synchronizer that allowed a machine gun rigidly fixed on the hood to shoot through a rotating propeller, missing another shot at the moment when the propeller blade was in front of its barrel. In fact, Raymond Saulnier developed his synchronizer back in 1914. However, then this invention was not appreciated and it was “put on the shelf”, but in 1915, thanks to Garro, they remembered it. Garro, with the help of Saulnier, mounted this installation on his Moran. True, the French synchronizer turned out to be unreliable, and the machine gun now and then worked at an unnecessary moment, shooting through the blades. Fortunately, this was revealed even when shooting on the ground and, in order to avoid death, steel plates were fixed on the propeller blades at the level of the machine-gun barrel, reflecting the “slipped” bullets. This made the propeller heavier and worsened the flying qualities of the airplane, but now it was armed and could fight!

The first ever synchronized machine gun mount designed by Saulnier

Solnier and Garro mounted a synchronized machine gun on Roland's Moran-parasol at the end of March 1915, and already on April 1, Garro successfully tested the synchronizer in battle, shooting down the first enemy aircraft - this day was the birthday of fighter aircraft. For three weeks in April 1915, Garro destroyed 5 German airplanes (although the command recognized only 3 of his victims as official victories). The success of the specialized fighter was obvious. However, on April 19, Garro's airplane was shot down by German infantrymen and the Frenchman was forced to land on enemy territory and surrender (according to other sources, Garro's engine simply died out). The Germans studied the novelty they got, and literally 10 days later, their own synchronizers appeared on German aircraft.

Engine: Gnome (80 hp), speed 120 km/h, armament: 1 synchronized Hotchkiss machine gun

The German synchronizer was not an improved copy of the French, as many aviation enthusiasts believe. In fact, in Germany, a similar device was developed back in 1913-1914 by engineer Schneider. It's just that this invention, as in France, was not initially positively evaluated by the German leadership. However, a number of losses suffered from the fire of the new French fighter, as well as the Saulnier synchronizer that the Germans got as a trophy, pushed the Kaiser aviation command to give the go-ahead to their new mechanism.

German version of the machine gun synchronizer, designed by engineer Schneider and manufactured by Anthony Fokker

The Dutch aircraft designer Anthony Fokker, who served Germany, installed this synchronizer on an airplane of his own design, and in June 1915 the production of the first German serial fighter Fokker E.I, better known as the Fokker-Eindecker, began.

Anthony Hermann Gerard Fokker

This plane fell in love with German aviators and became a real thunderstorm for the Entente aviation - it easily dealt with the clumsy low-speed airplanes of the French and British. It was on this plane that the first aces of Germany fought - Max Immelman and Oswald Boelke. Even the appearance of the same specialized fighters by the enemy did not change the situation - for 1 Eindecker lost in battle, there were 17 Entente airplanes destroyed. Only the entry into service at the beginning of 1916 of the allied biplane fighters Nieuport-11 and DH-2 restored the precarious balance in the air, but the Germans responded to this by creating a new version of the Fokker E-IV with a more powerful engine and three (!) Synchronized machine guns. This allowed the Eindecker to hold out at the front for another six months, but by the middle of 1916 the Fokkers had finally lost their superiority and were replaced by more advanced machines. A total of 415 Indeckers were produced in four modifications.

Engine: Oberrursel U (80 hp on E-1, 160 hp on E-IV); speed: 130 km/h - E-1, 140 km/h - E-IV; weapons: E-1 - 1 synchronized machine gun "Parabellum" or "Spandau"; E-IV - 3 synchronized Spandau machine guns

Almost at the same time, the first French specialized fighters with machine guns Moran Saulnier N began to enter the French air units (49 pieces were produced in total). However, this machine turned out to be too strict in control, besides, it had constant problems with the synchronization of the machine gun. Therefore, the Moran Saulnier N was not widely used, and in August 1916 the few remaining vehicles were excluded from the units (but 11 Morans N sent to Russia fought there until the autumn of 1917).

Engine: Ron 9C (80 hp), speed: 144 km/h, armament: 1 synchronized Hotchkiss or Vickers machine gun

In June 1915, French aviation began to receive large numbers of Nieuport-10 biplane fighters (1000 units). This airplane went into production even before the war, but in the first year of fighting it was a reconnaissance aircraft. Now Nieuport-10 has been converted into a fighter. Moreover, the aircraft was produced in two versions: a heavy two-seat fighter with two non-synchronized machine guns, and a lightweight single-seat fighter with one fixed course machine gun above the upper wing (without synchronizer). The absence of a synchronizer on the most massive French fighter is due to the fact that the French synchronizer was still imperfect, its adjustment kept getting off, and the machine gun began to shoot off the blades of its own airplane. It was this that forced the French engineers to raise the machine gun to the upper wing so that the fired bullets flew above the propeller; the accuracy of firing from such a weapon was somewhat lower than from a synchronized machine gun on the hood, but still it was some kind of solution to the problem. Thus, this aircraft turned out to be better than Moran Saulnier, and therefore it became the main French fighter for the entire second half of 1915 (until January 1916).

Fighter Nieuport-10 in a single version with an unsynchronized course machine gun "Lewis" above the wing
Engine: Gnome (80 hp), speed: 140 km/h, armament: 1 unsynchronized machine gun "Colt" or "Lewis" above the wing

The first SPAD aircraft, the SPAD A2 two-seat fighters, began to arrive in French air units (99 pieces were produced). However, this airplane did not satisfy the French pilots either: it turned out to be too heavy and slow, and the gunner's cockpit, fixed directly in front of the fighter's rotating propeller, was also unusual. The shooter who was in this cockpit was actually a suicide bomber: the shooters died when the aircraft was nosed, there were cases of the cabin being torn off the car right in the air when its pillars were shot through; it happened that the arrow's scarf fluttering in the wind fell under the furiously rotating blades behind him, wound around the propeller and choked the person ... Therefore, the French accepted only 42 airplanes (they were used on the Western Front until the end of 1915). The remaining 57 SPAD A2s were sent to Russia, where they fought until they were worn out.

French SPAD-2 fighter with Russian aviation insignia
Engine: Ron 9C (80 hp), speed: 112 km/h, armament: 1 movable course machine gun "Lewis", "Madsen" or "Vickers"

The Pfalz fighters began to arrive in the air unit of the German aviation. These machines were Moran-Saulnier type airplanes, which were built in Germany under a license purchased from France. Instances of the Palatinate, turned into fighters by installing a synchronized machine gun on the hood, received the marking Palatinate E. In terms of its performance characteristics, this aircraft was almost identical to Eindecker, but the power of the Palatinate company could not be compared with the power of the Fokker company. Therefore, the Palatinate E fighter remained in the shadow of its famous counterpart, and was produced in a small series.

Engine: Oberursel U.O (80 hp), speed: 145 km/h, armament: 1 LMG.08 synchronized machine gun

French aviation received in large quantities a very successful Nieuport-11 1.5-plane fighter for its time with an unsynchronized Lewis machine gun mounted above the upper wing. The new aircraft was a smaller version of the Nieuport-X, which is why the pilots gave it the nickname "Bebe" - "Kid". This aircraft became the main French fighter of the 1st half of 1916 (1200 units were produced) and the first Allied fighter that surpassed the German Eindeker fighter in its qualities. "Bebe" had excellent maneuverability, ease of control and good speed, but had insufficient structural strength, which sometimes led to the "folding" of the wings at high overloads. 650 of these airplanes were in service with Italy, and 100 in Russia.
A significant drawback of Nieuport-11 was the too high location of the machine gun, which was very difficult to reload in battle (for this, the pilot had to stand in the cockpit, holding the control knob with his knees!). The British and Russians tried to remedy this deficiency by developing systems for dropping machine guns to reload into the cockpit. The French, on the other hand, put up with this shortcoming in their own way: for example, Jean Navart, when firing, stood up in the cockpit to his full height and aimed at the enemy through a machine gun sight ...

IN FEBRUARY

British DH-2 fighters (400 units) arrived in France to participate in the battles, which quickly became obsolete due to the appearance of more advanced aircraft by the enemy, but nevertheless, until the spring of 1917, they remained the most common RFC (Royal Air Force) fighter. The aircraft had good horizontal maneuverability, but was poor on verticals, rather slow, difficult to pilot, and tended to spin. Most of its shortcomings were due to the outdated concept of the aircraft: in order not to invent a synchronizer, the British made this airplane not with a pulling propeller, but with a pusher propeller. The engine installed behind the gondola freed the nose of the airplane for a machine gun, but this arrangement of the engine and the pusher propeller did not allow increasing the speed and power of the machine. As a result, the DH-2 was inferior in quality to enemy aircraft; however, for lack of a better thing, the British had to fight for a long time on this airplane ...

IN MAY

French aviation received a new airplane Nieuport-17 (2000 pieces) - an extremely successful fighter for its time, in which it was possible to get rid of the shortcomings of Nieuport-11 while maintaining all its advantages. Nieuport-17 and its modification Nieuport-23 remained the main French fighters until the end of the year, in addition, they were armed with British, Belgian, Italian, Greek and Russian pilots; even the Germans modeled on the captured Nieuport 100 Siemens-Schuckert light fighters, which were used mainly on the Eastern Front.
The Nieuport-17 finally received a synchronized machine gun on the hood, although some French pilots also installed an unsynchronized overwing machine gun (modeled after the Nieuport-11) to increase the power of fire.

In May 1916, a new German Halberstadt biplane fighter appeared on the Western Front (227 built). He had good maneuverability and strength, but in all other respects he was inferior to the Nieuports. Nevertheless, before the advent of the Albatros series aircraft, the Halberstadt airplanes, along with the Eindekers, were the main fighters of the Kaiser aviation.

IN AUGUST

In Northern France, the British began to use the F.E.8 fighter (300 pieces), which was superior in quality to the DH-2, but had almost no chance of success in battles with new German fighters. During the 2nd half of 1916, most of the machines of this type were shot down, and they were removed from service.

In August, the fighter units of France received the first SPAD-7 biplanes, which in all their qualities had complete superiority over all enemy fighters. This determined the constant increase in the production of a new aircraft (3500 built), which by the spring of 1917 had become the main fighter of the French Air Force; in addition, this aircraft was in service with the British (405 units), Italians (214 units), Americans (190 units) and Russians (143 units). The aircraft was very popular among the pilots of all these countries because of its high speed, good handling, stability in flight, due to the reliability of the engine and structural strength.

IN SEPTEMBER

The first German Albatros D.I fighters arrived at the front, immediately gaining popularity among German pilots due to their outstanding flight data for that time. According to the experience of the first battles, it was slightly improved in the same month, and the Albatros D.II became the main fighter in Germany in the 2nd half of 1916 (in total, German aviation received 50 D.I and 275 D.II).

IN OCTOBER

The Italians adopted the French-made Anrio HD.1 fighter, which the French themselves abandoned due to the fact that they were already producing an almost identical Nieuport. On the Apennine Peninsula, Anrio became the main fighter (900 pieces) and was successfully used by the Italians until the very end of the war.

In October, the Hansa-Brandenburg fighter (95 units), designed by the Germans specifically for Austria, entered the Austrian aviation, which until the spring of 1917 was the main fighter of the Austrian aviation.

The new British fighter Sopwith "Pap" (1850 pieces) began to participate in the hostilities in the West, which aroused the love of British pilots with its ease of control and excellent maneuverability. He participated in the battles until December 1917.

DECEMBER

The fighter units of Germany began to receive a new Albatross D.III aircraft, which became the main German fighter in the 1st half of 1917 (1340 units were produced) - by the beginning of the spring of 1917 it accounted for 2/3 of the entire fighter aircraft fleet. German pilots called this car the best fighter of its time.


In December, the German fighter units received another car - the Roland D.II, which was somewhat faster than the Albatross, but the complexity of its piloting, the tendency to stall into a tailspin, poor downward visibility on landing and the unreliability of the engine quickly turned the pilots against this car, in as a result, after 2 months, the production of Roland was discontinued (440 units were produced).

IN JANUARY

The best aces of the French Air Force began to receive for personal use the first 20 SPAD-12 cannon fighters in history, equipped with 37-mm single-shot Hotchkiss cannons. Is it true,

most of the aces who became interested in the novelty soon switched back to machine-gun vehicles - manual reloading of the cannon turned out to be unsuitable for air combat. However, some of the most stubborn pilots achieved notable successes on this unusual machine: for example, Rene Fonck shot down at least 7 German aircraft on a cannon SPAD.

Austrian aviation began to be equipped with a fighter of its own production - Aviatik "Berg" (740 pieces). It was a successful fighter, unpretentious in operation and pleasant to fly; he was highly appreciated by opponents - the Italians. In terms of flight characteristics, the Berg Aviatik was superior to the Albatross and was very popular with pilots; most of the Austrian aces flew on it. The peculiarities of the aircraft were that it had good longitudinal balancing at low speeds and good longitudinal controllability at high speeds, and the rears of the machine guns were located next to the pilot, which made it easy to service the weapon.

French aviation received a new version of its main fighter, the Nieuport-24, which had improved aerodynamics compared to its predecessor. In total, 1100 of them were produced, the aircraft was used until the end of 1917.

This machine finally received a reinforced airframe design, and the constant problem of Nieuport pilots - wing separation during a dive - receded.

In April, 6 British fighter squadrons fighting in France received a new Sopwith Triplane fighter (150 pieces), which caused a whole storm of enthusiastic responses from the pilots. This machine had good speed and almost incredible maneuverability; its only drawback was weak small arms. However, the combat service of this aircraft was short-lived: the appearance of a more powerful Camel, which had almost the same maneuverability, led by the end of the summer of 1917 to the complete disappearance of the Triplane from the troops.

In April, the first British fighter unit arrived in France, equipped with the latest SE-5 fighters - one of the most popular British fighters. The Se-5 had slightly worse horizontal maneuverability than the Nieuport, but had excellent speed and durability, as well as easy piloting and good visibility.

On the Western Front, the British-built D.H.5 aircraft (550 units) began to be used as part of the Australian and Canadian fighter units, which was not popular with pilots, because. was unstable when taxiing, difficult to pilot, difficult to gain altitude and easily lost it in combat; The advantages of the car were great strength and good visibility.

In May, the Austrian aviation began to receive the OEFAG fighter, created on the basis of the German "Albatross D.III", but surpassing its progenitor in a number of parameters (526 units built).

IN JUNE

In early June, the British fighter units fighting in France began to receive the new Sopwith Camel aircraft, which had exceptional maneuverability for a biplane, equating it in this regard with the triplane class, excellent speed and powerful small arms. As a result, the Camel became the most popular fighter among British pilots, and after the war it turned out that this aircraft was also the most productive of all the Entente fighters! In total, the British industry produced about 5,700 Camels, which by the end of the war were equipped with more than 30 fighter squadrons.


In June, the French received the best fighter of that time, the SPAD-13, which, compared to its predecessor, had greater speed and fire power, although stability deteriorated somewhat and piloting became more complicated. This aircraft became the most massive fighter of the 1st World War (9300 pieces) and was the main French fighter of the second half of the war.

In June, the Bavarian fighter units of the German aviation received the Palatinate D.III aircraft (1000 units were produced), which was inferior in flight characteristics to the German Albatross, although it surpassed it in strength.

Since July, Belgian pilots began to fly on the already mentioned French fighter Anriot HD.1, who preferred this machine to any other Entente aircraft. In total, during the war, the Belgians received 125 of these aircraft.

IN AUGUST

In August, the German air unit Yashta-11 received 2 copies of the new Fokker Dr.I Triplane fighter for front-line tests.
IN OCTOBER

In mid-October, Richthofen's squadron received another 17 Fokker Dr.I triplane fighters, after which this aircraft began to enter other air units (320 units were built). The car received very conflicting reviews: on the one hand, it had excellent rate of climb and unique maneuverability, but on the other hand it was difficult to pilot and very dangerous for low-skilled pilots due to low speed compared to the enemy and insufficient wing strength (which caused a number of catastrophes and put all machines of this type out of action for the whole of December for work to strengthen the wing). This aircraft was especially loved by high-class German aces for the advantages it gave experienced pilots in maneuverable combat.

In January, 4 British fighter squadrons and 1 air defense squadron received a new Sopwith Dolphin aircraft (1,500 built in total), which was intended to escort bombers and attack ground targets. The aircraft had good performance characteristics and was obedient in control, but the pilots disliked this car because in the event of a nose-over or even just a rough landing, the pilot, due to the design features of this aircraft, was simply doomed to death or, at best, severe injury.

IN FEBRUARY

In February, Austrian aviation received Phoenix fighters (236 units) - an aircraft with good speed, but inert, strict in control and not stable enough in flight.

In March, the French handed over to the American aviation, which was preparing for battles in France, their new Nieuport-28 fighters (300 pieces) - they themselves did not accept this unsuccessful aircraft into service because, with good speed and maneuverability, the Nieuport-28 was no longer could be compared with enemy aircraft in terms of climb and ceiling, and also had weak structural strength - during steep turns and dives, the skin was torn off from the planes. The Americans used the Nieuport-28 only until July 1918. After a series of disasters, they abandoned this aircraft and switched to SPADS.

In early April, the best German fighter of the 1st World War, the Fokker D.VII, appeared at the front, which became the main German fighter at the end of the war (3100 units were built). Almost equal in speed to "Spuds" and SE-5a, it far surpassed them in other indicators (especially - on verticals). This machine immediately gained immense popularity among German pilots.

At the end of May - beginning of June, the Bavarian units of the German aviation began to receive a new Pfalz D.XII fighter (800 pieces in total), which surpassed the main German Albatross D.Va fighter in terms of performance characteristics; however, this machine did not become popular with the Bavarians, as they had already heard about the excellent qualities of the new German Fokker D.VII fighter. The operation of this machine was accompanied by a large number of accidents, and in some cases, the pilots deliberately crashed the plane, hoping to get a Fokker in return ...

Modification
Wingspan, m
Height, m
Wing area, m2
Weight, kg
empty plane
normal takeoff
engine's type
Power, hp
Maximum speed, km/h
Cruise speed, km/h
Flight duration, h
Maximum rate of climb, m/min
Practical ceiling, m
Armament:	Can mount 1 7.7mm Lewis machine gun

FLIGHT PERFORMANCE

F.15 F.16 F.16 float F.20
1912 1913 1913 1913
Wing, m. 17.75/ 13.76/ 13.76/ 13.76/
11,42 7,58 7,58 7,58
Length, m. 9.92 8.06 8.5 8.06
Wing area, sq.m. 52.28 35.00 35.00 35.00
Dry weight, kg. 544 410 520 416
Takeoff weight, kg 864 650 740 675
Engine: Gnome "Gnome" "Gnome"
power, l. With. 100 80 80
Max speed, km/h 96 90 85 95
Set time
altitude 2000 m, min 55
Flight range, km 220 315
Ceiling, m. 1500 2500 1500 2500
Crew, pers. 2 2 2 2
Armament no no no 1 machine gun
100 kg of bombs

Farman XXII
FLIGHT PERFORMANCE

F.22 F.22bis F.22 float
1913 1913 1915
Wing, m. 15.0/7.58 15/7.30 15/7.58
Length, m. 8.90 8.90 9.0
Wing area, sq.m. 41.00 40.24 41.00
Dry weight, kg. 430 525 630
Takeoff weight, kg 680 845 850
Engine: "Gnome" "Gnome-"Gnome"
Monosupap"
power, l. With. 80 100 80
Max speed, km/h 90 118 90
Set time
altitude 2000 m, min 55
Flight range, km 300 320
Ceiling, m. 2000 3000 1500
Crew, pers. 2 2 2
Armament 1

Looking at these photos, there is only bewilderment and admiration - how did they manage not just to fly, but to conduct air battles on these structures made of planks and rags ?!

On April 1, 1915, at the height of the First World War, a French plane appeared over the German camp and dropped a huge bomb. The soldiers rushed in all directions, but did not wait for the explosion. Instead of a bomb, a large ball landed with the inscription "Happy April First!".

It is known that in four years the warring states carried out about one hundred thousand air battles, during which 8073 aircraft were shot down, 2347 aircraft were destroyed by fire from the ground. German bomber aircraft dropped over 27,000 tons of bombs on the enemy, British and French - more than 24,000.

The British claim 8,100 enemy planes shot down. The French - at 7000. The Germans admit the loss of 3000 of their aircraft. No more than 500 vehicles were lost by Austria-Hungary and other allies of Germany. Thus, the reliability coefficient of the Entente's victories does not exceed 0.25.

In total, the aces of the Entente shot down over 2,000 German aircraft. The Germans admitted that they lost 2,138 aircraft in air battles and that about 1,000 aircraft did not return from the enemy’s position.
So who was the most productive pilot of the First World War? A careful analysis of documents and literature on the use of fighter aircraft in 1914-1918 shows that it is the French pilot René Paul Fonck with 75 air victories.

Well, what about Manfred von Richthofen, to whom some researchers attribute almost 80 destroyed enemy aircraft and consider him the most productive ace of the First World War?

However, some other researchers believe that there is every reason to believe that Richthofen's 20 victories are not reliable. So this question is still open.
Richthofen did not consider French pilots to be pilots at all. Quite differently, Richthofen describes the air battles in the East: "We often flew, rarely went into battle and did not have much success."
Based on the diary of M. von Richthofen, we can conclude that Russian aviators were not bad pilots, there were simply fewer of them compared to the number of French and English pilots on the Western Front.

So-called "dog fights" were rarely organized on the Eastern Front, i.e. "dog dump" (maneuverable air combat involving a large number of aircraft), which were common on the Western Front.
In winter, planes did not fly at all in Russia. That is why all the German aces won so many victories precisely on the Western Front, where the sky was simply teeming with enemy aircraft.

The greatest development in the First World War was received by the air defense of the Entente, forced to fight German raids on its strategic rear.
By 1918, in the air defense of the central regions of France and Great Britain there were dozens of anti-aircraft guns and fighters, a complex network of sound-location and advanced detection posts connected by telephone wires.

However, it was not possible to provide complete protection of the rear from air attacks: in 1918, German bombers raided London and Paris. The experience of the First World War in terms of air defense was summed up in 1932 by Stanley Baldwin in the phrase "the bomber will always find a way."

In 1914, Japan, in alliance with Britain and France, attacked German troops in China. The campaign began on September 4 and ended on November 6, and was marked by the first use of aviation in the history of Japan on the battlefield.
At that time, the Japanese army had two Nieuport monoplanes, four Farmans and eight pilots for these machines. Initially, they were limited to reconnaissance flights, but then hand-dropped bombs began to be widely used.

The most famous action was the joint attack of the German fleet in Tsingtao with the fleet. Although the main target - the German cruiser - was not hit, a torpedo boat was sunk.
Interestingly, during the raid, the first air battle in the history of Japanese aviation also took place. A German pilot flew up to intercept the Japanese planes on the Taub. Although the battle ended inconclusively, the German pilot was forced to make an emergency landing in China, where he himself burned the plane so that the Chinese would not get it. In total, during the short campaign, the Nieuports and Farmans of the Japanese army made 86 sorties, dropping 44 bombs.

Infantry aircraft in combat.

By the autumn of 1916, the Germans had developed requirements for an armored "infantry aircraft" (Infantrieflugzeug). The appearance of this specification was directly related to the advent of assault group tactics.
The commander of the infantry division or corps to which the squadrons Fl. Abt first of all needed to know where his units were located at the moment, leaking over the trench line and promptly transmit orders.
The next task is to identify enemy units that intelligence could not detect before the offensive. In addition, if necessary, the aircraft could be used as an artillery spotter. Well, during the execution of the task, it was envisaged to strike at manpower and equipment with the help of light bombs and machine-gun fire, if only so that they themselves would not be shot down.

Three companies Allgemeine Elektrizitats Gesellschaft (A.E.G), Albatros Werke and Junkers Flugzeug-Werke AG received orders for devices of this class at once. Of these J-designated aircraft, only the Junkers aircraft was a completely original design, the other two were armored versions of the reconnaissance bombers.
This is how the German pilots described the assault actions of the infantry Albatrosses from Fl.Abt (A) 253 - First, the observer dropped small gas bombs that forced the British infantrymen to leave their shelters, then in the second run, at a height of no more than 50 meters, fired at them from two machine guns installed in the floor of his cabin.

Around the same time, infantry aircraft began to enter service with strike squadrons - Schlasta. The main armament of these detachments were multi-purpose two-seat fighters, such as the Halberstadt CL.II / V and Hannover CL.II / III / V, the "infantry" was a kind of appendage to them. By the way, the composition of the reconnaissance units was also heterogeneous, so in Fl. Abt (A) 224, except Albatros and Junkers J.1 were Roland C.IV.
In addition to machine guns, infantry aircraft were equipped with 20-mm Becker cannons that appeared by the end of the war (on a modified AEG J.II turret and on a special bracket on the port side near the gunner's cockpit at Albatros J.I).

The French squadron VB 103 had an emblem of the red five-pointed star 1915-1917.

Russian aces of the first world

Lieutenant I.V. Smirnov Lieutenant M. Safonov - 1918

Nesterov Petr Nikolaevich

In 1914, all countries of the world entered the war with aircraft without any weapons, with the exception of the personal weapons of the pilots (rifle or pistol). As aerial reconnaissance increasingly began to affect the course of hostilities on the ground, a need arose for a weapon capable of preventing enemy attempts to penetrate airspace. It quickly became clear that fire from hand weapons in aerial combat is practically useless.
At the beginning of the last century, views on the prospects for the development of military aviation were not particularly optimistic. Few believed that the then, to put it mildly, not perfect aircraft could be an effective combat unit. However, one option was obvious to everyone: from an airplane, explosives, bombs and shells could be dropped on the enemy. Of course, in the amount in which the carrying capacity allows, and at the beginning of the 20th century it did not exceed several tens of kilograms.

It is difficult to say who first came up with such an idea, but in practice it was the first to be applied by the Americans. On January 15, 1911, as part of Aviation Week in San Francisco, "an airplane bombing took place." Don't worry, no one was hurt during the show.

At the start of World War I, bombs were dropped by hand.

In battle, apparently, the Italians were the first to drop bombs from aircraft. At least it is known that during the Italo-Turkish war in Libya on November 1, 1911, Lieutenant Gavotti dropped 4 4.4-pound grenades on Turkish troops from the side.

However, it is not enough just to drop a bomb from an aircraft, it is desirable to drop it with precision. In the 1910s, attempts were made to develop various sights. In the Russian Empire, by the way, too, they were quite successful. Thus, the instruments of Staff Captain Tolmachev and Lieutenant Sidorenko received in most cases favorable reviews. However, as a rule, almost all sights were first followed by positive reviews, then the opinion changed to the opposite. This happened due to the fact that all the instruments did not take into account the side wind and air resistance. At that time, the ballistic theory of bombing did not yet exist; it was formed by the efforts of two Russian scientific centers in St. Petersburg and Moscow by 1915.

The workplace of the observer pilot: bombs and a box of Molotov cocktails

By the mid-1910s, in addition to airplane bombs weighing several pounds, other types of projectiles were also known, namely, a large number of various "airplane bullets" and "arrows" weighing 15-30 g. "Arrows" are generally an interesting thing. They were metal rods with a pointed end and a small cruciform stabilizer. In general, the "arrows" resembled the "darts" from the game "Darts". They first appeared in the French army at the very beginning of the First World War and showed high efficiency. They even began to make up legends about them, claiming that these things pierce through a rider with a horse. In fact, it is known that when dropped from a height of 1 km, 500 arrows were dispersed over an area of ​​​​up to 2000 square meters, and once "a third of the battalion, located on rest, was put out of action by a relatively small number of arrows dropped from one airplane." By the end of 1915, 9 different samples of aviation bullets and "arrows" were adopted by the Russian Air Force.

"Arrows"

What can be dropped from an aircraft was not the only armament of aircraft in those days. In 1914-1915, front-line pilots independently tried to adapt automatic weapons for air combat. Despite the fact that the order of the military department to equip airplanes with Madsen machine guns was issued already 10 days after the start of the war, it took quite a long time for the squadrons to receive these weapons, by the way, pretty outdated.

Aviators of the 5th Army Joint-Stock Company near the Voisin aircraft armed with the Maxim machine gun. April 1916

In addition to obtaining machine guns from warehouses, there was another problem. The most rational ways of installing aviation weapons on an aircraft have not been developed. Pilot V.M. Tkachev, at the beginning of 1917, wrote: “At first, a machine gun was put on an airplane where they found it more convenient for one or another purely technical considerations and in the way that the constructive data of the device suggested in one case or another ... In general the picture was as follows - a machine gun was attached to this system of the apparatus wherever possible, regardless of what the other combat qualities of this airplane were and what its purpose was, in the sense of the upcoming tasks.

Until the end of the First World War, there was no consensus on the types of combat aircraft. Clear ideas about bombers and fighters will appear a little later.

The weak point of the aviation armament of that time was an aimed attack. Bombing at the then technological level of development could not be accurate in principle. Although, by 1915, scientific research in the field of ballistics made it possible to switch to the production of bombs with a reduced tail, which somewhat increased the accuracy and efficiency of the shells. Automatic weapons also did not differ in particular accuracy, the ring sight could not provide it to the required extent. Collimator sights, developed by Zhukovsky's students by 1916, were not put into service, since there were no factories and workshops in Russia at that time capable of mass-producing them.

Introduction of new technologies
In early 1915, the British and French were the first to put machine guns on aircraft. Since the propeller interfered with the shelling, initially machine guns were placed on vehicles with a pusher propeller located at the rear and not preventing firing in the forward hemisphere. The first fighter in the world was the British Vickers F.B.5, specially built for air combat with a machine gun mounted on a turret. However, the design features of aircraft with a pusher propeller at that time did not allow the development of sufficiently high speeds, and the interception of high-speed reconnaissance aircraft was difficult.

Some time later, the French proposed a solution to the problem of firing through the propeller: metal lining on the lower parts of the blades. Bullets hitting the pads were reflected without damaging the wooden propeller. This solution turned out to be nothing more than satisfactory: firstly, the ammunition was quickly wasted due to the ingress of part of the bullets into the propeller blades, and secondly, the impacts of the bullets still gradually deformed the propeller. Nevertheless, due to such temporary measures, the Entente aviation managed to gain an advantage over the Central Powers for some time.

On April 1, 1915, Sergeant Garro in a Morane-Saulnier L fighter shot down an aircraft for the first time with a machine gun firing through the rotating propeller of the aircraft. At the same time, the metal reflectors installed on the Garro aircraft after the visit of the Moran-Saulnier company allowed the propeller not to be damaged. By May 1915, the Fokker company had developed a successful version of the synchronizer. This device made it possible to fire through the propeller of the aircraft: the mechanism allowed the machine gun to fire only when there was no blade in front of the muzzle. The synchronizer was first installed on the Fokker E.I.

The appearance of squadrons of German fighters in the summer of 1915 was a complete surprise for the Entente: all of its fighters had an outdated scheme and were inferior to the Fokker apparatus. From the summer of 1915 to the spring of 1916, the Germans dominated the skies over the Western Front, securing a substantial advantage for themselves. This position became known as "Fokker's Scourge"

Only in the summer of 1916, the Entente managed to restore the situation. The arrival at the front of maneuverable light biplanes of British and French designers, which were superior in maneuverability to the early Fokker fighters, made it possible to change the course of the war in the air in favor of the Entente. At first, the Entente experienced problems with synchronizers, so usually the machine guns of the Entente fighters of that time were placed above the propeller, in the upper biplane wing.

The Germans responded with the appearance of new biplane fighters Albatros D.II in August 1916, and Albatros D.III in December, which had a streamlined semi-monocoque fuselage. Due to the stronger, lighter and more streamlined fuselage, the Germans gave their machines better flight characteristics. This allowed them to again gain a significant technical advantage, and April 1917 of the year went down in history as "bloody April": the Entente aviation again began to suffer heavy losses.

During April 1917, the British lost 245 aircraft, 211 pilots were killed or missing, and 108 were captured. The Germans lost only 60 airplanes in combat. This clearly demonstrated the advantage of the semi-monococcal regimen over previously used ones.

The Entente's response, however, was swift and effective. By the summer of 1917, the arrival of the new Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5, Sopwith Camel and SPAD fighters restored the air war. The main advantage of the Entente was the best state of the Anglo-French engine building. In addition, since 1917, Germany began to experience a severe shortage of resources.

As a result, by 1918, the Entente aviation achieved both qualitative and quantitative air superiority over the Western Front. German aviation was no longer able to claim more than a temporary achievement of local dominance on the front. In an attempt to turn the tide, the Germans tried to develop new tactics (for example, during the summer offensive of 1918, air strikes on home airfields were widely used for the first time in order to destroy enemy aircraft on the ground), but such measures could not change the overall unfavorable situation .

Air combat tactics in the First World War
In the initial period of the war, when two aircraft collided, the battle was fought from personal weapons or with the help of a ram. The ram was first used on September 8, 1914 by the Russian ace Nesterov. As a result, both aircraft fell to the ground. On March 18, 1915, another Russian pilot used a ram for the first time without crashing his own plane and successfully returned to base. This tactic was used due to the lack of machine-gun armament and its low efficiency. The ram demanded exceptional accuracy and composure from the pilot, so Nesterov's and Kazakov's rams were the only ones in the history of the war.

In the battles of the late period of the war, aviators tried to bypass the enemy aircraft from the side, and, going into the tail of the enemy, shoot him with a machine gun. This tactic was also used in group battles, and the pilot who took the initiative won; causing the enemy to fly away. The style of air combat with active maneuvering and shooting at close range was called "dogfight" ("dog fight") and until the 1930s dominated the concept of air warfare.

A special element of the air combat of the First World War were attacks on airships. Airships (especially of a rigid design) had quite numerous defensive armament in the form of turret machine guns, at the beginning of the war they were practically not inferior to aircraft in speed, and usually significantly outperformed in rate of climb. Before the advent of incendiary bullets, conventional machine guns had very little effect on the airship's shell, and the only way to shoot down an airship was to fly right over it, dropping hand grenades on the ship's keel. Several airships were shot down, but in general, in the air battles of 1914-1915, airships usually emerged victorious from meetings with aircraft.

The situation changed in 1915, with the advent of incendiary bullets. Incendiary bullets made it possible to ignite the hydrogen, mixed with air, flowing out through the holes pierced by bullets, and cause the destruction of the entire airship.

Bombing tactics
At the beginning of the war, not a single country had specialized aerial bombs in service. German zeppelins carried out their first bombing sorties in 1914, using conventional artillery shells with cloth planes attached, aircraft dropped hand grenades on enemy positions. Later, special aerial bombs were developed. During the war, bombs weighing from 10 to 100 kg were most actively used. The heaviest aviation munitions used during the war years were at first a 300-kilogram German aerial bomb (dropped from zeppelins), a 410-kilogram Russian aerial bomb (used by Ilya Muromets bombers) and a 1000-kilogram aerial bomb used in 1918 in London from German multi-engine bombers "Zeppelin-Staaken"

Devices for bombing at the beginning of the war were very primitive: bombs were dropped manually according to the results of visual observation. Improvements in anti-aircraft artillery and the resulting need to increase the height and speed of the bombardment led to the development of telescopic bombsights and electric bomb racks.

In addition to air bombs, other types of aviation weapons also developed. So, throughout the war, airplanes successfully used throwing arrows-flechettes dropped on enemy infantry and cavalry. In 1915, the British Navy successfully used seaplane-launched torpedoes for the first time during the Dardanelles operation. At the end of the war, the first work began on the creation of guided and planning bombs.