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§ 100 bases at high altitude, and their employment to determine an ascendancy over an enemy less fortunately situated; the utilisation to their full extent of air-currents, etc. It must be remembered that an advantage in altitude can be always turned to account to give a temporary advantage in speed, as in the swoop of a bird of prey. We may look confidently to the wide employment of such swooping tactics in the future of aerial warfare. The advantage possessed by an air fleet having its base at high altitude, sometimes even some 6,000 ft, or 8,000 ft, above sea-level, will be very great; it will have the initial advantage of the upper berth, and this under some circumstances may result in the enemy fleet, or sections of it, being kept flying for long periods together at high altitude in order to avoid the possibility of being engaged in action at a disadvantage. Such a process might conceivably result in the wearing away of a hostile air fleet to such a degree as to determine its ultimate defeat.