THE TONDERN RAID STRIKE FIGHTER CENTENNIAL

摘要

The roots of the Tondern mission stretched back to the beginning of World War I. Throughout the war, the Royal Navy operated a variety of aircraft at sea. A 20,500-ton ex-passenger liner became the seaplane tender and aircraft carrier HMS Campania when she was commissioned in April 1915. She cruised the Mediterranean and Aegean with as many as ten small flying boats. Probably the best-known use of Royal Navy shipboard aircraft occurred during the epic Battle of Jutland at the end of May 1916. Supporting the British battle-cruiser squadron, Flight Lieutenant Frederick Rutland and his observer G. S. Trewin, off the 1,700-ton seaplane tender HMS Engadine, spotted the smoke of the German screening vessels and radioed a contact report-the first such use of radio in combat. ( "Rutland of Jutland," spent most of World War Ⅱ confined for espionage on behalf of Japan.) But something more potent emerged on the naval aviation horizon.