The daily monitor. (Mount Clemens, Mich.) 1940-1942, 1941-04-24
Tanks
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NSVutAu0OV VNI 6KC
tank manufacturing arsenal
were made with simplicity, char
acteristic of free people whose
quiet will has been fired by the
emergency of the moment.
WELL PLANNED
"Since the World War Ord
nance Department Officers in
cooperation with leading indus
trialists have never ceased to
plan for the day when the armed
forces might have to call upon
private industry for the mass
production of the tools with
which the Army fights.
I'm our work in preparation
for the day of need, we have
striven for that decentralization
Of Ordnance Department plan
ming and procurement that our
World War experience had
taught us was advisable. In
times when the nation was in
terested in almost anything ex-
cept the problems of Army Ord
nance procurement we carried
forward our planning, aided by
our Ordnance Reserve officers
and by business men and in
dustrialists. We made surveys
and estimates of the potential
tiles of private industry for the
production of ordnance material,
and when the present emergency
arose, we knew what industry
could do and industry could
know what we wanted done.
COORDINATION
I'VE have officers, both act
i've and reserve, who spoke the
language of business and indus
try, and who knew the problems
of labor. The old barriers be-
tween the business man and the
soldier were broken down and
there will be none to- deny that
the achievements that we cele-
brate here today could not have
been attained if these outmoded
barriers had remained.
"The wars of today are wars
Of national effort. They are
won by those who can bind
themselves in cooperative en-
deavor and lost by those who
cannot. No group in our ma
tional life realized this sooner
or realized it more completely
than the officials of the Ord
nance Department. The Govern
ment-owned arsenals of the Ar
my could provide only . small
fraction Of the weapons, am
munition and other ordnance
equipment needed by q nation
fully under arms. The sinews of
private industry In this great
est of all industrial countries
can and must provide the great
er portion of this equipment.
SWIFT CONSTRUCTION
"The schedule maintained in
building this Tank Arsenal may
we'll become historic evidence of
newly awakened sense Of re-
sponsibility on the part Of all
concerned with re-arming in de-
tense of the American Way. On
August Is last, a contract for
constructing and equipping q
military tank plant for produc-
ton of Is ton tanks was award
ed by the United States Govern
ment to the Chrysler Corpora
ton. Mr.. Keller and other
Chrysler officials and technic-
ians had already visited the Ord
nance Department Arsenal at
Rock Island, Illinois, to study q
vehicle of this type being built
by the Army. Returning to De-
troit with 1873 pounds of blue
prints of the improved tank, Mr..
Keller and his technicians went
to work to establish designs Of
a production line and . neces
sary list of tools to be used.
This schedule, so splendidly
maintained in the face of many
difficulties, enables us to look
forward with confidence to 4
tank production program that
will move much faster than
that of the World War. At
that time only eighty tanks