Wartime industry

“ If there is a great reaction, and everybody's one desire is to throw this nightmare of war off their chests and go back to the times as they were before it happened, then all that the war has taught us about the production of capital will have been wasted. But I rather doubt whether this will be so. Saving merely means the diversion of a certain proportion of the output of industry into the further equipment of industry. The war has taught us lessons which, if we use them aright, will help us to increase enormously the output of industry. ”

“ Of course it is difficult for those who are not accustomed to give close attention to the problems of production to appreciate how deeply a world war of four years' duration affects every industry; and especially so when on one side the war was waged on the principle of destroying everything that could be got at, whether it was military or civil property, whether it was an enemy or a neutral possession. ”

“ But, perhaps more important still, the character of our production has entirely changed—almost our entire industry is producing for war purposes. Ordinary civil needs are no longer considered. We have of course to produce what is essential for life, but beyond that all our energies are directed to war production. ”

“ One thinks of the rapid recovery of French trade after the war of 1870, and of the far more rapid rate—after forty years of machine and transport development, at which the industry of the Allied countries may possibly recover the ravages of the present war, when once peace is signed. In that recovery, how great a part may yet be played by these war workshops!—transformed to the uses of peace; by their crowds of work-people, and by the hitherto unused intelligence they are everywhere evoking and training among both men and women. ”

“ But, apart from this actual destruction on the battlefield and on the sea, the tools and equipment of industry over the greater part of the earth remain untouched. It is true that, owing to the preoccupations of the war, not so much work as usual is being put into the upkeep and repair of our railways, factories and other industrial tools. ”

“ We are calling upon the resources, the efficiency and the ingenuity of the American manufacturers of war material of all kinds-airplanes, tanks, guns, ships, and all the hundreds of products that go into this materiel. The Government of the United States itself manufactures few of the implements of war. Private industry will continue to be the source of most of this materiel; and private industry will have to be speeded up to produce it at the rate and efficiency called for by the needs of the times. ”

“ At that difficult period we have to secure, if possible, that British industry shall be entirely unhampered in its endeavours to carry out the very puzzling operations involved by transferring its energies from war activities to peace production. ”

“ It was not until the Government of Britain, representing the Community, invited Capital, Management, and Labor to meet in common, and policies were arrived at as the result of Round Table Conference, that the necessary adjustments of industry were so arranged as to make possible the vast production of munitions required to win the War. What was necessary to the winning of the War is equally necessary to the winning of Peace — which we can hardly say exists so long as international strife gives way only to industrial unrest. ”

“ Today thousands of England's industrial plants are being operated as government factories for the production of war materials, and many other thousands of plants, still under private control, are centering their energies in this same direction.
"We have here in the United States vast resources in manufacturing and producing equipment, but they are unorganized and uneducated for the national service. Our observations of the European War have taught us that it is upon organized industry that we must base every plan of military defense. ”

“ If our history of the war economy had aimed at perfection, it would have included in each chronological Part a long chapter explaining carefully how the war production sector was built up. But the positive employment of resources in the field of war industry is an immense subject. ”

“ Even within the industries of Group III, many workers were shifting over from peace tasks to war tasks, stimulated by the restriction of materials for civilian contracts or, more probably, by the direct increase of government demand—for example, demand upon the textile industries for uniforms and other clothing, or upon the building industry for hutments and factories. ”

“ It must be borne in mind that the industrial locations particularly referred to are only a few of the many now involved in direct production for the war and of the even larger number concerned in the many and varied industrial contributions to the total essential war economy. To represent the location of the recommended system in relation to the distribution of total-war industry would doubtless give a result little different from the indications of figure 7, which mirrors the distribution of normal peacetime industrial activity. ”

“ The result of this is a great stimulation of manufactures and commerce. In the case of Germany, the effect on industry of the $1,000,000,000 of indemnity which she received from France following the Franco-Prussian war was so great that Germany was soon manufacturing more than her people could consume, and German commercial agents spread all over the globe seeking to find profitable customers for the surplus.
On the other hand, the German leaders have failed to realize that the destruction of men and materials in war is always a great national loss. ”

“ Let us give up, then, the puerility of applying to industrial competition phrases applicable to war,—a way of speaking which is only specious when applied to competition between two rival trades. The moment we come to take into account the effect produced on the general prosperity, the analogy disappears.
In a battle, every one who is killed diminishes by so much the strength of the army. In industry, a workshop is shut up only when what it produced is obtained by the public from another source and in greater abundance. ”

“ The largest challenges may be to shape and exploit this commercial potential and then to ensure that its enduring advantages become fundamental in the makeup of our military forces. Unlike the defense industrial base required during the Cold War, this new commercial base is neither heavy nor is it a massive industry relying on producing large things. ”

“ It is usually the experience after a war that the efficiency of labor is increased by the disposition to repair the waste of the conflict, and that the return of many thousands of men to peaceful industry not only restores, but increases the previous capacity for production. The prevalence of unusual economies also, both in Europe and the United States, will probably do something to offset the abnormal demand for investment capital for war purposes, and aid in the restoration of industry. ”

“ Revelations published since the Revolution confirmed the many rumours about favouritism and corruption in the distribution and execution of munition orders, even involving highly reputable members of the Industrial Committees.
But whether the motive was patriotism or gain, or both, certain it is that the manufacturers exploited this golden opportunity to the utter exhaustion of industry. The future of industry concerned nobody. All principles of sound economy and care in the use of machinery and plant were thrown over. ”

“ When the whole industry of a nation is mobilized behind the fighting line, it is not merely finished munitions that must be given priority in transportation, but also the materials and fuel for further munitions production. The food supply of the industrial population, as well as that of the army, has a claim to priority. So also have clothing supplies, lumber for housing, and whatever else is essential to working efficiency. In production it would be impossible to fix definite limits upon the application of the priority principle. ”

“ Its policies must be subject to the administration's general strategy in the war—for instance, to the amount of munitions in comparison with the number of men or the amount of food that it wishes to send abroad at any given time. The munitions program and the conversion of industry to war purposes must be governed by the ultimate end in view. In addition, one of the great factors in production—the labor factor—is being administered by another government agency, and it is obvious that priority in the labor supply must go hand in hand with priority in materials. ”

“ The exploitation, under military control, of Belgian factories in order to repair locomotives and automobiles, and also to obtain material of war for the front, is carried out for the purpose of relieving the strain on German industry and economizing transportation. It has become necessary to strip the Belgian factories of their machinery and other fittings, because all German industry is busy filling orders for material of war. * * * By relieving the home market from the necessity of enlarging our own factories we are accelerating the production of munitions and other products. ”

“ In consequence of the collosal transfer of the ranks of industry, there was a great decline in the agricultural and ordinary manufacturing production of Europe. Yet, the many millions of men in the field required more than the usual amounts of food and great quantities of clothing. The demand for ships, guns and munitions was insatiable. The result was an extraordinary call for essential commodities from the United States. ”

“ But suppose that to some extent it does stand, we have still the fact that the control of industry and capital, even as long as ten years after the war, will be mainly in the hands of men who have not fought, of business men spared from service either by age or by their too precious commercial skill. Towards these the soldier-workman will have no tender feelings, no sense of comradeship. ”

“ The capacity of engineering firms was increasingly absorbed by munitions work. Production of industrial machinery fell, and such goods as motor cars, [20] vacuum cleaners and refrigerators were among the first consumer goods to disappear. In fact, during the first nine months of war, the expansion of munitions work took place largely at the expense of the home and export trades of the engineering industry; [21] by June 1940 most sections of the engineering industry had only about twenty percent of their workers employed, on the home trade. ”

“ The entire commercial and industrial life of the country was established on a war basis very soon after war was declared. Trade had to be thus mobilized in order to defeat the efforts of the enemy to supply himself by roundabout and underground means with American products and in order to use efficiently the organization of commerce for the prosecution of the war. Industry had to be mobilized in order to make sure that it would produce all the enormous amounts of every sort that would be needed for war purposes. ”

“ In enormous factories, such as the world had never seen, tens of thousands of workmen toiled in casting great guns, while by their [25] side, in workshops and laboratories, every invention which the disinterested genius of neighbouring peoples had been able to achieve was immediately captured, bent from its intended use, and converted into an engine of war. Reciprocally, the army and navy which owed their growth to the increasing wealth of the nation, repaid the debt by placing their services at the disposal of this wealth: they undertook to open roads for commerce and outlets for industry. ”

“ A mania for increasing armaments has thus been produced, and although this state of things is far less destructive and demoralizing than actual war, it lays a burden upon Europe which is fast becoming intolerable. For the modern development of industry has given rise [Pg 187] to problems that press for solution, and no satisfactory solution can be reached in the midst of this monstrous armed peace. Competition has reached a point where no nation can afford to divert a considerable percentage of its population from industrial pursuits. ”

“ It is true that some 40 million men were at one time fighting in the war. But this is less than 21⁄2 per cent. of the world's population and it must not be forgotten that these 40 million were also consumers before the war. Their withdrawal from industry did not really create a vacuum of even 1 per cent. of the world's productive power; as women, boys and old men took their places and others worked harder than in peace time. ”

“ For We will not be eternally engaged in war; the time must come when this wholesale massacre, usually accompanied by the booming of cannon, will be condemned by humanity, so that the nation which desires conquest in addition to commerce, will not dare to carry out its designs. We must therefore prepare and break new ground for the peaceful struggles of industry. European industry has daily to search for new markets as an outlet for its products. ”

“ Apart from the trades making munitions of war, few factories maintained their full output. Recruiting lessened the number of employees, and those who stayed behind fought for shorter hours and higher wages. Investors generally eased off, as money was too high in value to risk in new concerns in such uncertain times. Even the highly boosted scheme to bring back to England from Germany the Aniline dye industry failed for the want of the necessary capital.
Then a great movement was inaugurated throughout the British Empire. "Trade only with the Allies." ”