The Waterbury Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury, Conn.) 1917-1946, 1943-07-15

If we had been unable to buy uni
forms from the British, many of
our soldiers would have had to wear
barrels. The British also supplied
helmets and gas masks. (The first
American-made gas masks nearly
Strangled a general and staffD
The French supplied us with ma
chine guns, except few of the ex-
cellent Brownings that were our one
real contribution to Allied firepow-
er. They struggled onto the final
battlefield just as we tried to pur-
sue the fleeing Germans afoot, be-
cause our great automotive indus
try had given thu A.E.F. .nly one
fourth the motor vehicles it asked.
The Amy vowed never again" and
embodied all the hard-learned les
sons in its Industrial Mobilization
Plan, which was SO good the Nazis
copied it and nearly won the war
with it.
WE LEAR.I, THE HARD WAY
But we had to learn all over
again, the hard way. Our President
and Congress discarded the Army's
careful blueprint for a blue haze of
overlapping agencies that spawned
confusion and delay. Only lately
was James F. Byrnes appointed
head of War Mobilization Board
with real powers such as those held
by Bernard M. Baruch, who in
World War I pulled production out
of a similar muddle. We might
never have profited by that exam
pie had not courageously practical
men and newspapers fought for it,
backed by public opinion.
Average Americans read more
quickly the lesson of the fall of
France than did many in Washing
ton. They saw that the first mea-
sures of President and Congress to
strengthen the nations defenses fell
short. They urged more speed and
fewer committees tripping over one
another. Although We had nineteen
months grace, Pearl Harbor caught
us short of high-power production.
Only in February, 1912 did the au-
tomotive industry 60 full-out. But
by January, 1913, all industry was
really working. Three-quarters of a
million war contracts had been let
since Pearl Harbor, and are pretty
we'll coordinated.
The equipment of our rs Expedi-
tionary Forces is ample and gener-
ally excellent. Our Tunisian expedi-
ton required 100000 sepc"o tie items,
including new weapons such as the
carbine and bazooka which have
helped increase infantry firepower
$50 per cent over 1918. Then our
artillery was French made. Today
our American made artillery equals
any.
STILL SOME SHORTAGES
We still are short of heavy anti
aircraft guns, tank guns and tank
destroyers, but partly because we
rushed some of them, with our ex-
cellent new medium tanks, to Egypt
to save Montgomery. Gone are the
days of training with wooden guns
All of the increasing troops in
this country may not have all their
basic equipment until 1914, but they
they will have enough to keep busy
Our expenditures have zoomed
like everything else. In 1941 our
war effort cost 1873 billions, in 1912,
SIS. In 1913 it will cost about LOG
billions. For the entire 10 months
we were in World War I, we spent
% billions.
Our loans to the Allies totaled an
other 10 billions some for war some
for reconstruction. All were to be-
come, as "the war debts, an irri-
tant to our relations with nations
naturally our, friends-and with re-
suits thta, like mustard gas, still
cling.
: This time we help our Allies by
| lend -lease-eleven billions worth
and still going. But already we are
getting back from those Allies more
than most people realize in planes,
guns, food, buildings-so much that
some authorities believe that by the
time the war ends, the loans may
have been repaid.
We started off on the wrong foot,
but we have advanced and have
shifted over to the right one. Today
we are producing at such a rate that
Mai Gen. Levin H. Campbell, our
Chief of Ordnance, told me: Power
is just running out of our ears"
Now we must apply that power
at the decisive points, as we are be-
ginning to do. We have not won this
war in 10 months, as We won World
War I, but we have got over the
biggest hump. On this anniversary
we can indulge in sober pride
and spit on our hands.