THE WAR IN THE AIR

The reader should grasp clearly the date at which this book was

written. It was done in 1907: it appeared in various magazines

as a serial in 1908 and it was published in the Fall of that

year. At that time the aeroplane was, for most people, merely a

rumour and the "Sausage" held the air. The contemporary reader

has all the advantage of ten years' experience since this story

was imagined. He can correct his author at a dozen points and

estimate the value of these warnings by the standard of a decade

of realities. The book is weak on anti-aircraft guns, for

example, and still more negligent of submarines. Much, no

doubt, will strike the reader as quaint and limited but upon much

the writer may not unreasonably plume himself. The

interpretation of the German spirit must have read as a

caricature in 1908. Was it a caricature? Prince Karl seemed a

fantasy then. Reality has since copied Prince Carl with an

astonishing faithfulness. Is it too much to hope that some

democratic "Bert" may not ultimately get even with his Highness?

Our author tells us in this book, as he has told us in others,

more especially in The World Set Free, and as he has been telling

us this year in his War and the Future, that if mankind goes on

with war, the smash-up of civilization is inevitable. It is

chaos or the United States of the World for mankind. There is no

other choice. Ten years have but added an enormous conviction to

the message of this book. It remains essentially right, a

pamphlet story--in support of the League to Enforce Peace.

K.

THE WAR IN THE AIR