Stiik made a few really good points on that.
During the 20th century, aviation has become the epitome of technological progress - from the very first "hops" in Kitty Hawk to the moon in just about six decades. Both media and propaganda were keen to publicize and feature aviators as pioneers, heroic record breakers or as those glamour boys fighting the enemy in and from the skies. And it's not only avout those magnificent men (and women) in their flying machines, it's also about the aircraft they flew.
During the late 19th and very early 20th century, kids were building model ships, in a way reflecting the (then) prevalent militarism - you gotta have a mighty navy to project power. Gunboat diplomacy, etc.
After World War 1, we saw a significant paradigm shift emerging - from ships to planes. So my take is, that scale modelling, when it comes to modelling subjects, positively reflects this.
My personal take: I'm biased. Both my grandpa and dad had very close ties to military aviation. Hence, it was only Besides, I grew up with Buck Danny, Mick Tanguy or Dan Cooper comics. Disaster was inevitable.
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