Evening star., 1941-11-17

arrange to have them manufac-
tured.
The BottIeneck Year"
The second year they call the
bottleneck year. They recognize that,
no matter how well their plans were
laid the machines for mechanical
war are SO complicated and call for
the coordination Of so many differ
ent kinds of talent and equipment
that there are bound to be bottle
necks. They recognize that it takes
about a year of intensive effort to
break these bottlenecks and to get
the whole industrial war machine
co-ordinated and in motion. Dur
ing this bottleneck year, planes and
tanks and weapons can be had but
not In sufficient quantity to insure
victory. The flow will be erratic and
the engineers promises cannot be
counted on because unforeseen diff
f1culties arise
The third year they call the year
Of surplus return. The plans that
they conceived two years earlier are
now producing surplus. above their
original expectations. There is more
than enough to 60 around. AS one
man put it to me:
This Is the secret Of mass pro-
duction: 1t is terribly difficult and
complicated to set up, but when 1t
really works you always get more
than you know what to do with
The British government thinks
that 1904 spring to spring. is the
bottleneck year. They believe that
by next spring British and Ameri-
can production programs. fitted to-
sether. will begin to produce real
surplus of the wherewithal of mech
anized war-not simply the tanks
and the planes, but the tanks and
the planes and all the thousands
upon thousands of other things that
must go with them.
Wavell to Be Heard From.
This conception Of the three-year
program is the source of both their
complacency about their present
PoSltioll hlll tllOll uIlCdSlllCSS dbOut
the aid-to- Russia movement.
They do not doubt the Importance
to them of keeping the Soviet army
in the field. II there is any pos
sible way they can get material to
Russian sufficient quantities and
in time-they will do it. They will
send armies to fight with the Rus
slams. You will soon hear of Gen
Wavells army in the Caucasus
But there Is a point in aid to Russia
beyond which they do not want to
go. Since they believe they will
have the war in hand in 1912 43,
they want to take no step which in
wolves any risk in their present po-
SitiOn.
It Is necessary to discuss this
phrase ANY risk" in great detail.
In this "bottleneck year" the British
it has material on hand vet for the
proper defense of the British Isles
1t is now willing TO admit privately
that Hitler could have taken Eng
land last year il he had pressed on
instead of hesitating at the Chan
mel He stopped to try to blitz the
British government into a nego-
tiated peace. Had the Luftwaffe
been willing to trade two planes for
one for another two weeks. there
would have been no air force to op-
pose it-and the air force was the
only sound defensive weapon the
British had on the island The
tanks had been lost in Belgium and
France-and so had most of the
automatic weapons. The army had
been beaten. and the British have
since had experience in Crete with
how we'll recently beaten army
can stand up against blitzkrieg.
Arms PilipE Up.
Ever since last fall. the best arms
the British have produced-and the
pick of what they have got from us
has piled up on the British Isles
until it seems today more like a
storehouse than a battle station.
This is a military debate that is
going on in every officers mess on
every front: Are the British Isles
overdefended today?
There is no question about where
the British Government stands in
this argument. It. does not believe
the British Isles are overdefended-
in fact. it does not even believe the
defense will be complete for another
few months 1t believes, however,
that within another few months the
British Isles will be really invulner-
able And that is its first and
wholly understandable objective
that the British Isles be invulner-
able. 1t Is, after all-people some
times tend to forget that fact-the
British government. There is moth
ing mysterious or sinister about
its putting the defense of the British
Isles first, whatever the aid-to-
Russia people say.
Whoever proves right In the ar
gument over whether the British
Isles are or are not overdefended,
this much is incontrovertible: the
defense OF the British Isles Is 80
wholly the preoccupation Of the
British government that it will not
send away a single flrst-class ma
chine, If it can help, even as far as
its own active fighting front in
Egypt.
An Army Of Hand Me Downs.
Egypt and the Suez Canal are very
important to the British Empire.
The story Of war in the Mediter-
ranean-which I will tell presently
Is the story OF a war for which the
second best must always be good
enough. The Army of the Nile