The Army Air Forces in World War II, Vol. 1 (archived PDF)

T H E A R M Y A I R F O R C E S I N W O R L D W A R I 1
Of special significance was the Air Corps’ policy of conducting its
own experimental program in an intimate association with the aircraft
and allied industries. Established during the years immediately follow-
ing the war, when as yet commercial aviation had not advanced to a
point that would support the infant aircraft industry, that policy was
continued thereafter as a means for maintaining in a state of readiness
industrial facilities and staffs of great importance to the military po-
tential of the nation. The Air Corps consistently opposed a popular
view that planes designed for commercial purposes could be converted
to military use, except for such an activity as air transport. But that
conviction was regarded as strengthening rather than weakening the
argument for experimental and educational contracts that would pre-
pare the industry for conversion to military production in time of
war, and that meanwhile would permit the Air Corps to borrow for
its own purposes some of the enterprising spirit of a new industrial
undertaking. The procedure established in the Air Corps Act of 1926
called for design competitions among manufacturers as a preliminary
to the drafting of developmental contracts. It became a traditional
policy to recognize the right of the contractor to amortize experi-
mental costs with income from later production The funds
actually devoted to research and development, in other words, were
by no means limited to those which were specifically so budgeted.
Indeed, the airman’s inclination to place the emphasis on experi-
mental work met an early resistance from higher authority, even in
the Air Service itself. For example, in October 1921 the acting chief
of the Supply Group in Washington formally expressed this view:
If we continue this policy of buying a dab of every kind of experimental type
of equipment that the Engineering Division in Dayton passes upon with the
idea of conducting a service test, it would not be long before the entire Air
Service would be engaged in service test work, and, should an emergency
develop, it would be impracticable to put any kind of an organization in the
field with the standard type of equipment.lG0
The problem, of course, was fundamental, and one which at all times
in some degree confronts authorities charged with responsibility for
military aviation. Just how shall the requirement of an air force ready
with standard equipment for any emergency be balanced against the
demand for a timely anticipation of new developments in a field of
the most rapid technological growth? When stringent budgetary limi-
tations exist, the problem is particularly difficult. And when, in addi-
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