Evening star., 1936-12-03
BY WILLIAM GILMAN.

displace iron. This is aluminium, ideal
for coating wings of death
Whatever havoc airplanes will pro-
duce, the powers now mobilizing still
have faith in walls of STEEL as witness
the wall Of forts, big guns and tanks
France Is throwing up on her eastern
frontiers. The race for bigger navies,
too. means a hunger for steel.
That hunger is being fed. Due in
part to returning prosperity, but also
to rearmament programs, the steel
furnaces of Pittsburgh, Lorraine, the
Ruhr and other centers are pouring
forth armor in streams such as the
world has not seen since 1929.
This brings up a matter of iron re-
sources. For manufacturing pig iron,
the parent steel, three materials are
neceSsary-iron ore, coke and lime
stone, the latter to remove impurities.
Limestone is plentiful. Most countries,
too, have coal. But iron ore resources
again find the world divided into the
"have" and have-not" powers. Again
the paupers are the notably pugna-
cious nations, Germany, Italy and
Japan.
Neighboring Opportunities.
The date of the next war could be
retarded a long time if these three
were convinced that nothing could
be done about their position. But
they look at their neighbors and be-
come optimistic.
Germany's strategy almost certainly
calls for a swift push into Luxem-
bong and Lorraine. These conquer
ed. there would be more than sufi-
cient iron ore with which to feed the
steel mills of the Ruhr.
Similarly, Italy has been taking
an active interest in Spanish affairs,
and one big reason is that Spain has
rich iron deposits. Japan's interest,
meanwhile, lies in the directions Of
North China and Malaga for similar
reasons.
Japan, who found that her Man
chukuoan adventure produced much
less iron than she had hoped. is
using a time-tried method of build
ing up her reserves-by substitution.
There Is no metal plentiful or cheap
enough to be substituted for pig iron.
But old iron-junk-may be substi-
tuted for pig iron as source of steel.
Consequently, Japan has become
the worlds steel scrap buyer, bringing
in huge quantities of railroad rails
and steamship hulls, and melting
them down into steel.
It is q daily occurrence for Japanese
agents to buy old ships in the United
States, overhaul them bit, take on a
minimum of coal, fill the vessels to
their brins with junk steel and carry
the cargo across the Pacific. There.
both the cargo and the ship are fed
to steel furnaces.
In 1881, Japan imported $4,000 tons
Of American scrap iron and steel. In
1882, the figure was $4,000 tons. In
1888, it was $4,000 tons. In 1884, it
was 100000 tons, and last year it
doubled again.
American iron and steel export
figures for 1884 reveal that nearly 50
per cent Of the tonnage went to Japan.
U. S. Situation Strange.
This drain Of scraps has produced
Q strange situation in the American
metal marts. Last September, the
price and demand for heavy melting
steel scrap had risen so high that the
Carnegie-Illinois Steel Corp. found a
new source of profit It actually went
ahead to manufacture artificial steel
scrap, by placing pig iron in Bessemer
converters and blowing" it.
Nor does Japan seek her scraps only
In this country. A recent report by
the Department of Commerce reveals
that exports of scraps from Java are
breaking all records, and all but few
tons Of the shipments head for Japan.
In general, the last few rearming
years nave seen the powers step up
steel production, whether they got the
iron ore at home or had to import it..
Germany, with a four-year self-suf-
f1ciency program to fulfill, is racing
against time. storing up iron reserves
by heavy importation Of ores from
Sweden, France and Spain.
The French program to place ring
Of steel" around Germany is no mere
rhetorical phrase. Last year, france
and her ally, Russia, produced almost
half Of the worlds iron ore, most of
1t going into the steel ring.
There Is an important difference,
however, in the programs of these two
nations, due to the fact that one toll
crates capitalism and the other does
not. In the Soviet Union, in contrast
to all other countries, raw materials
such as iron are strictly national
sources of strength. But in France,
the steelmanufacturing is done by
private capital for private profit.
The result is an ironic situation. A
great part of the French ore goes into
oermany's steel furnaces to produce
implements which may fight France
In the near future.
Last year, Uncle Sam produced ap-
proximately one-third Of the worlds
iron ore. If he cares, he can turn
out about 100000 gross tons Of
steel ingots annually-and that u
almost so per cent Of world capacity.
Depression years curbed the Ameri-
can output. But boom days are back