Directorate of Military Operations
under General Wilson, now Field Marshal and late Chief of the Imperial
General Staff, and was the only officer in the War Office who had
learned to fly. It appeared very important that a study of the military
possibilities of aviation should be made. The prime role of cavalry,
reconnaissance, seemed to have passed from it. In addition to my normal
duties, I visited France, Germany and Italy, collected information on
foreign activities, wrote reports, and tried to create a knowledge of
the possible effect of future military aeronautics and to urge the
formation of a flying corps.

In 1911 the Air Battalion of the Royal Engineers, consisting of
Headquarters, No. 1 Company (Airships) and No. 2 Company (Aeroplanes),
was formed and superseded the Balloon School. The creation of No. 2
Company, stationed at Larkhill, marked the first formation of a British
military unit composed entirely of heavier-than-air aircraft. The same
year witnessed the inception of the B.E., F.E. and S.E. type machines in
the Balloon Factory, but the total of our machines, both for naval and
military requirements, amounted to something less than twelve aeroplanes
and two small airships; and the mishaps suffered by the military
machines on their flight from Larkhill to Cambridge, to take part in
Army Man[oe]uvres, were significant of their unreliability.

_The Royal Flying Corps._

In view, therefore, of the reports received of the progress abroad, the
Air Battalion was clearly insufficient to meet the demands which might
be made upon it in the event of war; and at the end of 1911 the Prime
Minister instructed a standing Sub-Committee of the Committee of
Imperial Defence to consider the future development of air navigation
for naval and military purposes. As a result of their deliberations the
Committee recommended the creation of a British Air Service to be
regarded as one and designated the Royal Flying Corps; the division of
the Corps into a Naval Wing, a Military Wing, and a Central Flying
School; the maintenance of the closest possible collaboration between
the Corps, the Advisory Committee for Aeronautics and the Aircraft (late
Balloon) Factory; and the appointment of a permanent Consultative
Committee, named the Air Committee, to deal with all aeronautical
questions affecting both the Admiralty and the War Office.

Consequent upon these recommendations, a Technical Sub-Committee was
formed, consisting of