From beginning to end, this entire enterprise was so well planned and carried out, that we may well consider it one of the most successful operations in which the Navy ever engaged. CHAPTER XX THE NAVY THAT FLIES NAVAL AVIATION WATCHED OVER SHIPS AND SEARCHED THE SEAS--FIRST OF U. S. ARMED FORCES TO LAND IN FRANCE--FOUGHT ENEMY AIRCRAFT FROM HELIGOLAND TO POLA--ATTACKED U-BOAT BASES IN BELGIUM--NAVAL AVIATORS, IN TRAINING AND SERVICE, FLEW FIFTEEN MILLION MILES. The first of the armed forces of the United States to land in France were naval aviators--seven officers and 123 men, under command of Lieutenant Kenneth W. Whiting. One group, sailing on the _Neptune_, arrived June 5, 1917, at Pauillac, the port from which Lafayette sailed for America to join the struggling colonists in their war for independence. The other, on the _Jupiter_, reached St. Nazaire June 9, sailing through the very waters in which John Paul Jones operated in the Revolution. Eight miles up the river Loire lies Paimboeuf, where Jones in the _Ranger_ arrived November 30, 1777. Fifteen miles away is Quiberon Bay, where the French, February 14, 1778, fired the first foreign salute to the American flag. Naval aviation stations were erected at both Pauillac, which is on the Gironde river near Bordeaux, and at Paimboeuf, so the operations of America's flying navy in the World War were over the very waters where the name and fame of the first American navy were established 140 years before. We had stations all along the coast of France--at Dunkirk, St. Ingelvert and Autingues, headquarters of the Northern Bombing Group; L'Aber Vrach, Brest, Ile Tudy, Le Croisic, Fromentine, St. Trojan, Treguier, Arcachon, La Trinite, La Pallice, Le Fresne, Oye, Guipavas, Paimboeuf, Pauillac, Rochefort, St. Ingelvert, and Gujan, with a training school at Moutchic. [Illustration: ASSEMBLING NAVAL AIRPLANES AT BREST]