The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-11-12

m the making since the defense ef- fort began.
 Donald M. Nelson, executive direc- tor of the Supply, Priorities and AL locations Board, asked for this coHn- pilation just after SPAB was cre- ated two months ago. Army, Navy and civilian statisticians have fig- ured frantically ever since and the fact that the compilation won't be completed for another month indi- cates just how big the job has been. Looking at 1t from a consumers viewpoint, it would be like taking all the catalogs of all the lnanufac- turers and mail order houses in the
 country, combining them into a master catalog, and then listing how much of each itenl-from battleships to needles and pins-it will take to run the country for as long as anyone can estimate.
 so WE MAY KNOW
 When the compilation of finished products is completed it will then have to be added up so the totals can be broken down three ways for schedules of the nations civilian and military requirements in terms of raw materials, labor and Inachin- cry needed for production. When
 that's done, the government will begin to know a little bit about where the country stands and can figure accordingly.
 In case you wonder why this hasn't been done before, a lot of other people have been bothered by the same question. The simple truth is that until few months ago, mo- body thought in these terms. The idea of defense production-the pro- per conception of what all-out de- fense really meant-crept up over the country so gradually that 1lo- body knew the problem there was until. like a Halloween ghost, it reared its ugly head and said, "Boo!'
 You'll recall the cd talk about business as usual. It was thought then by government planners and business men as well that defense production could be piled on civilian production and merely take up the slack caused by the depression. The idea is very dead now.
 THERE WERE SOME
 CHANGES MADE
 When the war broke out in Europe, the United States Army, plus the National Guard, amounted to 365,- 900 men and the British and French thought they were going to get by with only limited purchases in the United States.
 In the spring of 194o when Ger many moved into Scandinavia and the low countries, Army and National Guard strength was a little over 50O,O00. In the fall of 1940, the selective service act was passed, authorizing an increase of not more than 100000 men at one time. The military supply problem was then worked out for a protective mobili- Zation of 100000 men, plus 100000 reserves, or 8 total force of 100000 men. The productive capacity for powder and ammunition was stepped up accordingly. Then came the des- troyers-fo for- Atlantic -bases swap, and new supply problems mad to be worked out for them.
 Tn the spring of 194l, the lease- lend act was passed and the Army was authorized to acquire critical items-military supplies on which there might be shortages or winch take considerable time to nanufac- ture-to equip an additional 4,000,- 900 men. That meant the supply problem had to be worked out for a total of 6,00O,000 men.
 In June, 194i, came the invasion of Russia, followed in the fall Of 1941 by the second lease-lend ap- propriatlon. In between, the Burma Road was opened for increased supp pies to China, and additional supp plies were marked for export to the East Indies. Some of the supplies intended for U. S. military forces were diverted to lease-lend countries, meaning that additional equipment had to be ordered to maxe up these shortages.
 On top of these must be piled al- locations of materials for helnis- phere defense supplies for the South American countries and the newly acquired bases in Greenland and Iceland. And civilian require ments must be figured in to boot.
 So all over Washington these days, the adding machines are clicking like machine guns. Center of the ac- tivity is the office of Undersecretary of War Robert Patterson. He is try Ing to find out what 1t takes, for say, 5000, 900 men. SPAB Director Nell son now says all necessary defense agencies having been created, there's no reason why the program can't move ahead at full speed once these requirements are known.