Radio age research, manufacturing, communications, broadcasting, television (1941)

Science is soaring to new alti- tudes. In the upper atmosphere there are new wonders of the fu- ture, new benefits for the welfare of all people, new power for indus- try and transportation. In the stratosphere lie swift routes be- tween nations and broad highways to new continents in physics and c)iemistry. Air Has Become Common Medium The explorer who now seeks, as Columbus did, a new passage to India, or a Northwest passage as did Sir John Franklin, must tra- verse high altitudes. The links to world union will be welded in space. Today, the air is the common pas- sageway of mankind where once it was the land and the water. The air, of course, has been ever pres- ent, but man did not learn how to use it until the turn of the century when radio and aviation were born. As a result of the vision of Marconi and the Wrights, and others who followed them, the air has become a common medium that brings nations together. By radio, Moscow and Chungking are as near to Washing- ton as Cincinnati and New York. By airplane the great cities of the world are only hours apart. Radio now spans the gaps of the hemisphere, leaps frontiers, ignores boundaries and cannot be stopped by any man-made political "curtain." For radio goes everywhere — and through word and picture can bring information and understanding to all peoples of the world. Already we are on the threshold of individual radio communication. A motorist on the streets of New York may talk with a friend in Bombay, or with a relative on a ship somewhere on the Seven Seas. The day is coming when radio will speak man to man, and television will place them face to face in New York, London or Shanghai. All this is the essence of one world. Distance Is No Security These remarkable advances of sci- ence emphasize the importance of the United Nations and its respon- sibilities to world welfare. Space has been a formidable fort through- out the ages. Enemies had to get within range by arrow, shot or shell in order to wage warfare. But sci- ence has shrunk space, and distance no longer provides protection or na- tional security. Today's weapons are not confined to a range of a few miles as in the past. In World War II, big guns showered projectiles across the English Channel. Robot bombs and rockets travelled even greater distances and were directed to their targets by radio. Shells carried radio proximity fuses which caused them to explode when close to the target, whether it was a ship or a plane. Now, if a missile is launched into the stratosphere to travel at 3,000 miles an hour as predicted for the decade of the Fifties, then space completely fades as a bulwark of defense. Hindenburg, Maginot, and Siegfried Lines are crumbled fables of the past. Trench, channel, river, mountain or forest are part of the past's outmoded military strategy, rendered impotent by science. By radio and radar a high-speed mis- sile, loaded with germs or explo- sives, can be guided with such pre- cision that the Atlantic and Pacific are no more effective in preventing attack than was the Delaware River when Washington crossed it. RADIO NOW SPANS THE GAPS OF THE HEMISPHERES, LEAPS FRONTIERS, IG- NORES BOUNDARIES AND CANNOT BE STOPPED BY ANY MAN-MADE POLITICAL "CURTAIN". THE RADAR "PEEP" THAT ECHOED FROM THE MOON . . . WAS AS IMPORTANT AS THE FIRST FEEBLE TRANSATLANTIC SIGNAL TO MARCONI'S EARS WHEN HE PLUCKED THE LETTER "S" FROM THE OCEAN AIR.