Abstract

It Seems to Heywood Broun

At present the airplane's chief importance is that of a new engine of war. It was the plane which carried death and destruction behind the lines to the non-combatant. This, to be sure, may prove a factor in the establishment of peace. Possibly nations will kindle less quickly under the realization that neutral zones have been abolished and that another conflict would find even the most secluded hamlet a city of the front. But it seems to the author that time must wipe out the memory of the young dead in shattered cities before all begin to worship the flying machine as a beneficent thing. It would be silly to deny that the airplane may serve to enrich life and living. It can wipe out boundaries and mountain chains for warlike purposes, but this same conquest of the wide spaces could serve to emphasize a feeling of international solidarity.