Our front cover shows a young member of the Auxiliary Territorial Service (usually abbreviated A.T.S.), intent on the job of spotting enemy planes. Note that the device seems to call for the use of two senses - sight and hearing - requiring concentration and constant alertness. Britain's radio manufacturers did a terrific job, early in the struggle, when they concentrated all their energies on fabricating the radiolocation sets that later contributed to a great extent in winning the Battle of Britain. Now that the location stations are set up, they help enormously in speeding up the take-off of defense planes over England. So part of the tribute must go to these gallant lassies of the A.T.S. who have come from all walks of life to take the place of men in "desk jobs," enabling the men to take their places in combat or supporting ranks. These girls in the special services are specially selected and trained. The training is intense and requires intelligence and keen perceptive powers. It might be mentioned here also that the new women's units of the Navy, Army, Coast Guard and Air Force will probably perform similar functions in this country. Some of them have already had extensive experience with the interceptor commands in tracing the flight of planes in and about our coastline. Others, trained in code and message handling, as pertains to interception, also will fill men's jobs in the various services. When this gets under way we visualize a terrifically efficient handling of all modes of defense in this global war. Photo British Combine. |