Evening star., 1940-04-01
European Orders
MayMake US. Leader
In Air, Says Arnold
Air Corps Chief Also
Says SuIes Saved Us From
Having Obsolete Force

The United States aviation in
dustry, as result of national de-
fense and European orders, Is be-
coming "a potent, semi-mobilized
element of national defense which
may even be destined to dominate
air development throughout the
world" Maj. Gen. Henry H. Arnold,
chief of the Army Air Corps, says
In signed article written for the
locally published magazine, U. S.
Air Services, made public today.
In his article, one of the first
authoritative summaries by Gen
Arnold to be made public concern
Ing the air defense program, the
Air Corps chic, estimates that the
monthly capacity of the Nations
aviation industry within year will
reach a. total of 1900 airplanes and
1900 engines, 'or an annual rate of
14.400 airplanes and 27,600 engines
Gen. Arnold characterized the
food of European war orders as
highly beneficial to the United
States in gearing up our aviation
industry to production basis. He
declared that our aviation industry,
despite the expansion period
through which it is going is sound
and that it is holding up well under
"our first real attempt at air mobil-
ization."
Europe's Orders Saved Air Corps.
Gen. Arnold also voices belief
that the rapid development made
possible by European orders may
have saved the United States from
building up national defense air
force composed of aircraft which
would have been obsolete by the
time the building program is COM
pleted June 80, 194l.
I'm this emergency" Gen. Arnold
said, I'VE could have gone out and
let contracts for standard types
without much trouble. We would
have been sure of what we were
getting. easily could have reached
an objective of $500 airplanes by
July l, 194l, and we would have un-
doubtedly saved ourselves lot of
headaches. There was, however,
one serious hitch about this line of
reasoning which gave us the cold
shiverS each time We thought about
1t. 1t was this:
BY purchasing standard types, on
July l, 1910, we would have found
ourselves with $500 obsolete air.
planes. Under the stimulus of i'm
minent war Europe was bringing
out late models of superior perform
ance. Those planes would leave us
hopelessly behind in performance
had we followed the line of least
resistance and said to the industry,
Go ahead and make us few more
thousand like the last order
Models Progress Sped.
Luckily our service test and ex-
perimental development projects
were in state where we could
afford to reach out and hurry some
types along the production road.
Furthermore. the industry had al
ready produced some prototypes
with greatly improved performances.
Certain foreign governments realized
the advantages of these planes and
gave some of our companies substan-
tial orders. This helped consider
ably toward the redesign and i'm
provement of our models. BY jump
ing into production on airplaneS and
engines with limited history be-
hind them meant increase in per-
formance and insured us that when
our aircraft were delivered they
would be equal or superior to any
thing in Europe"
struction under the European orders
had made it possible for the industry
to work out engineering problems
which in the normal course of events
normally require period of two
years for production of a new type
of airplane. AS result, the Air
Corps decided to eliminate the serv-
Ice test period on new airplanes and
to accelerate the transition from
experimental models to production.
we simply could not afford to
have $500 airplanes on hand two
years hence that were deficient in
performance compared with those
of other nations" the general ex-
planned. 1T is always we'll to bear
in mind that the second best hand
IN a poker game is the one that
really costs you money"
$500 Being Built.
Work now is in progress on ap-
proximately $500 of the airplanes
for the United States Army which
were set up for procurement last
year, Gen. Arnold said. Deliveries
began early last fall on training
bombardment, pursuit, attack and
observation will start next month.
The total number of deliveries
a month, which will approximate
l25 airplanes this month, gradually
rises to peak of between 275 and
300 by January, 194l, and continues
at a rate of approximately $50
month until the end of the pro-
gram" the general said.
Engine production is ahead of