Zeppelin (Airship) Aircraft of a streamlined shape that is kept aloft by the aerostatic buoyancy of the lifting gas (hydrogen or helium) in its body. Forward thrust is provided by propeller engines that are housed in nacelles mounted outside of the body. Derived from Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin, who in 1900 had produced the first practicable airship of a rigid design that was motorized and steerable, the name also became a synonym for other technical solutions. Against the backdrop of a possible war with Britain, the development of zep…

Aircraft After the Wright brothers achieved lift with the aid of a propeller driven by a combustion engine and thus in 1903 completed the first powered flight, most industrial nations saw rapid improvements taking place in the technical reliability, endurance and range of airplanes. France, as the leading European aircraft builder, possessed 100 military planes as early as 1911, while Germany had only begun training military pilots in 1910 on planes purchased from private owners. The Prussian Gen…

Immelmann, Max (September 21, 1890, Dresden – June 18, 1916, Northern France [crashed]), German airman and officer. After graduating from school and completing his training as a reserve officer in a Prussian railway regiment, Immelmann studied mechanical engineering at the Technical University of Dresden from 1912 to 1914. Called up for active military duty in the railway forces at the beginning of the war, he was then trained as an airplane pilot and stationed on the Western Front from 1915 onwar…

Aerial Warfare A form of waging war in and from the air with airborne or ground-based weapons against war-critical targets and the air power of the enemy, and in direct or indirect support of land or naval forces. These forms and features of a war being fought in and from the air had been contemplated and partially put into practice in the years leading up to World War I, but the key concepts were laid down by the major powers based on their aerial operations between 1914 and 1918. In the highly-developed industrial nations, with th…