Goshawk Squadron by Derek Robinson Page B

chivalry,” he said, and his flat Midlands accent made the word sound medical. “This is not true. I try to kill the man with the first shot. I see no point in needless pain.”
    Kimberley could not tell if Woolley were serious or mocking. He looked away.
    â€œTo kill with the first shot,” Woolley went on, “means getting close. The closer the better. Twenty-five feet, one length of the airplane, is a good distance. Fifty feet is the maximum. I am talking now about the first shot. Get in close and kill him before he knows it. Marksmanship is more important than flying skill. If you can kill him first, you won’t need to out-fly him. If you miss, you lose the advantage of height and surprise. The enemy has a chance to out-fly you, and if he has a better machine he will probably kill you. Never give him a chance to fight on even terms if you can sneak up and kill him first. Do you all follow that?”
    The wind licked at the white cloth and peeled up one corner. Woolley stood on it.
    â€œSuppose there’s a lot of them,” Gabriel said.
    â€œKill one or two and run away,” Woolley told him. Gabriel nodded as if that was what he expected.
    â€œThe second reason why this is a good target is that it’s the same size as the vital part of the airplane.” Woolley turned his back on them and sat in the middle of the cloth. “Your bullets must hit this. Never shoot at the airplane. A Fokker or an Albatros or a Pfalz does not bleed. You can perforate a Triplane until it looks like old net curtains, and the pilot will end up killing you and flying home.” He stood up. “Shoot at the pilot. If you miss him you may still hit the gas tank or the engine.”
    â€œThat’s all very well,” said Finlayson sourly, “but in a dogfight you have to fire at whatever presents itself.”
    â€œIt’s just luck, really,” said Dickinson.
    â€œAnyone who depends on luck is a fool and a suicide,” Woolley said. He squinted at the overcast sky. “The sun is
there,”
he pointed. “Come out of the sun and fire one burst of ten rounds from no higher than fifty feet. Red flag for a hit, white for a miss.”
    They walked to their aircraft, which stood gently shuddering against their chocks, the engines droning in unison. Gabriel, Dangerfield and Finlayson discussed the best angle of approach.
    â€œThe flatter you come in, the longer you can take to pull out,” Dangerfield said. “So you get a better chance to aim.”
    â€œBut you reduce the visible area of the target,” Finlayson said. “Ideally, you should come straight down on it.”
    â€œAt fifty feet?” Gabriel asked.
    â€œHe’s never made us do this before,” Dangerfield said. “If you ask me, it’s bloody dangerous.”
    â€œThat, it would seem, is half the point,” Gabriel said. “Incidentally, taking the old man’s philosophy to its logical end, I presume that one would be expected to destroy an enemy machine even if one knew that, say, the pilot were injured or out of ammunition, and therefore unable to fight back.”
    â€œOh, shut up,” Finlayson said.
    Dickinson was the first to dive. He came out of the nonexistent sun at 45 degrees and concentrated on keeping the nose pointing just below the tablecloth, remembering that the Lewis gun would fire high to clear the propeller. The wind tugged the machine one way and he nudged it back. At fifty feet he squeezed the gun lever just as another block of air shouldered into the little SE5a. The short burst made the plane tremble.
    He pulled firmly back and cleared the target by twenty feet.
    White flag.
    Rogers was hard behind him but he undershot and came in shallowly, and only touched the Lewis lever for a second before veering away.
    White flag.
    Lambert learned from them both, steepened his angle, and left everything a fraction later. His plane seemed to swoop down a