The First Fighter Aircraft

Royal Aircraft Factory B.E.9 Reconnaissance Aircraft 

Fokker Triplane

The term "Fighter" came from the development in aviation in 1914, in the middle of the first year of the first world war, the skies became home to reconnaissance aircraft. Using cameras whilst flying over enemy lines, they were able to gather vital information about enemy gun emplacements, infantry and supply movements from the safety of the skies. But there was a problem, these reconnaissance aircraft often met one another in the skies and could do nothing but watch their enemy as they flew by one another. Until the development of the machine gun this was the case, but by the observer having a machine gun mounted at the rear of the aircraft, he was able to fire at the other plane. This obviously caught on on both fronts so reconnaissance aircraft began having battles above the trenches, but they were slow and not very maneuverable so the fights never became anything much, until the creation of the "scout" aircraft which was the first aircraft used in war to have only one seat, the pilot would control both the guns and the aircraft. These "scouts" were used to chase and destroy enemy reconnaissance aircraft with ease. But when scouts met each other in the air, they fought. This was how the term "dog fighting" came around because according to a British officer it looked like two dogs, chasing each others tails. The machine guns were originally wing mounted which meant that the pilot had to reach up and pull the trigger, lifting his hand off the controls, but when the planes started to have machine guns mounted on the nose of the aircraft, this caused a bigger problem, how do you get the machine gun to fire through the propeller, without chopping the propeller up yourself? This triggered the creation of the synchronization mechanism which only allowed the machine gun to fire at intervals where the propeller was not in front of the guns. This was first developed by German manufacturers "Fokker". This major advance meant that the German pilots had a great advantage over the British for some time until the British captured a German Fokker aircraft and examined the gun before implementing it into their own aircraft.

Fokker's Synchronization Mechanism 

The Aircraft of this time were made of wood and canvas, with metal struts holding the planes top wings to the bottom. This meant that just a small tear could be the difference between life and death for a pilot, and with no parachutes in these times, if you went down, you would die. 

In 1916, a German Ace, Oswald Boelcke wrote the first ever rules of aerial engagement. Which again fundamentally increased the German advantage throughout the course of the war. 

(For more information, visit the "Dicta Boelcke" and early fighter tactics" section of the blog) 

Oswald Boelcke was Germany's Ace of Aces and was the mentor of maybe the most well known Ace of all time, Manfred Von Richtofen or "The Red Baron".

Oswald Boelcke had been a pilot in the German Air force since the start of the war in 1914 and had gone on to gain over 50 kills on British and French pilots, but when he tragically died in a mid air collision with one of his own aircraft, he was quickly surpassed in kills by The Red Baron who's eventual tally met 73 kills before his death on April 21st 1918.

Manfred Von Richtofen or "The Red Baron"

Oswald Boelcke