Word: plane
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...pattern of flight at Xieng Kho was repeated all along the river. A single-engine Beaver plane loaded with grenades, small arms and munitions, which was squared off to land at the weedy Muong Het airstrip, was met by machine-gun fire, barely got back to report that Muong Het had also fallen. An entire royal Laotian battalion of some 700 men, plus 400 home guards, had been cut to pieces...
...change that missiles have brought to the industry. They not only promise the end of manned military bombers and fighters, but have brought such other lightning changes that huge projects, calling for hundreds of millions of dollars, can be made obsolete almost overnight. To meet the challenge, the plane-and enginemakers are well aware that their industry must undergo the fastest and most radical change in its history...
Almost every dollar the U.S. commits to missiles is squeezed out of some plane program. All told, the U.S. will order only 1,500 planes this year compared with 1,760 last year. Next year the cuts will be bigger. Of the fabled Century series of supersonic fighters, the fiscal 1960 budget allocates not a penny for North American's F-100 Super Sabre, McDonnell's F101 Voodoo, Convair's F-102, Lockheed's 1,400-m.p.h. F-104 Starfighter or Convair's F-106. Only one tactical plane is funded in the new budget...
...missiles, some planemakers have already drastically changed their companies. Some are still hustling to do so, and some face the grim prospect that they must either merge with a bigger company or shut up shop. The change has already begun to cut heavily into profits. The plane industry, said one broker sadly, is the "only industry in a recession." In the first six months of this year, sales of the 15 largest aircraft companies slipped 5% and profits tumbled 45%. Among the giants, General Dynamics' earnings dropped from $20 million to $11 million, Boeing's from $20 million...
...figured that the fighter might well be shelved by missiles, started right after World War II to get ready. Now, with its Rocketdyne Division making many of the big rocket engines and with a backlog of $758 million for projects running from nuclear reactors to the X-15 (the plane that is expected to be the first to fly into space), North American's profits are on the upturn. They will rise from $26.8 million last year to $28 million in the fiscal year ending this month...