The Sentinel=record., 1918-12-18
DEMONSTRATION GIVEN OF
 AMERICAN PROGRESS
United States Has on Hand Now An Enormous Stock of Ammunition for All tie Army's Standard Guns France Supplied With Ammunition
 at Rate of 2o0o 900 Rounds a Month

Washington, Dec 17-Faced by q pres ram of producing 2,0OO guns of all cali0res per month, without dis tmbing the flow of guns to the allied nations, or the navy's prior right Jnv ordnance bureau of the war depart ment had achieved an output of about 500 guns month when the armis- tice ended hostiities By June Of next year production would nave been in fuh swing,
 These facts were revealed today by Assistant Secretary Crowell. director of munitions, i'll personally con duc:ed trip to the new proving grounds at Aberdeen, Maryland.
 MT Crowell said the United States mad formulated it's muntion plans so as to not interfere with the sin and ammunition contracts for France and Great Britain. Many American gun forgings and compldted gnuus have been poured across toSGreat Britain and shipments to the French armies had reached a total of ,000 guns d month.
 The needs of tde navy. also gave it priority aud the shipping board came next in the list for steel and other commodities needed to carry out the huge program mapped out for the American army itself This placed the American ordnance pro gram fourth on the list with the ne- eaif fef Inn I. up.
 A striking feature of what Was ac- complished, it was shown by officers at the proyngs ground, was the fact that in the 1j5 fHowitzer program an output lad been reached that ex- ce9ded the estimated needs of the A> ,rican forces. even in ,he oasis of four million men in France. and six hundred Howttzers were sold to France as excess.
 The demonstration today covered all of the trench warfare weapons and the field artillery, including the six inch guns taken from American coast defensCs and many oi which reach ed the front as field guns before the war ended
 It took in almost the first public demonstration Of thc giant guns mounted on railway carriages, soliJ ranks of inch, II inch, and l6 inch weapons hurliug projectiles over the range.
 Among the guns fired were a ltl inch mortar and a 16 inch Howitzer, Both were mounted on especially de siened railway carriages. A If inch rifle of extreme range and power. al so was railway mounted and so de signed that the recoil is taken up in the backward movement of the whole massive carriage along the ttacks. also was fired
 1t is a purely American outrut and is the first of the great mobile sea coast batteries to foe added to the Ge- fense of the country.
 The tank demonstration today was the three ton, two man type, of American design 4 production of one hundred q day of these swic;, machine guns armed land ships was | came 10 an end
 Early in the spring il would have been reached experimenting the six ton tank program upon which the United States was working jointly with the British both in design ana manufacture.
 Mir. Crowell said that G,000 of the big tanks were in process of manu fracture in the Uinted States alonu.
 All the working parts of many otn- CTS were built in the nited States and shipped to England for assembly. in this way they reached the front with British or American crews.
 A whole fleet of American artillery tractors also was demonstrated, as were two new types of guns develop ed in this country One was an Isl inch Howizter mounted upon q tractor which plouehed over rough gro tnd or through hoavy woods,