Just finished rereading Freedoms Forge
Apr 1, 2016 8:55:37 GMT -5
Post by rah on Apr 1, 2016 8:55:37 GMT -5
This book Freedom's Forgeis about how the captains of industry worked together to mobilize the economy for WW II. Many have bought into the lefts revisionist history that claims that the government was the driver and administrator of that great economic boom. This book reveals how dishonest that claim is while providing a great deal more interesting information about that event.
The US produced 324,750 aircraft during WW II. As for ships The US alone produced 141 Aircraft carriers (the majority smaller types), 8 battleships, 807 cruisers- destroyers- destroyer escorts, 203 submarines, 52 million tons of commercial shipping including 2,710 Liberty Ships along with numerous large tankers. Also over 1,000 LSTs and 1,000s upon 1,000s of smaller vessels. By 1945 the output of the US in all of the above exceeded the output of the rest of the nations in the world combined. The US supplied 88,410 tanks, tank destroyers and self propelled guns, 257,000 artillery pieces, 2.4 million trucks and 2.6 million machine guns and the 41 billion rounds of ammunition to go with all of that.
The industrial base that produced those massive quantities of materials also, unlike all other major combatants, was able to continue to produce adequate consumer goods at the same time. Despite the rationing of tires, meats and certain other things, and the lack of Automobile manufacturing, compared to the economies of the UK, USSR, and Germany, Italy, and Japan who had completely turned their economies to war production, the US was a cornucopia of consumer goods. The US had actually only converted just over 47% of it's economy to war production in 1944 compared to 60% for the UK and the GErmans and Soviets were well above the UKs level in that respect. Fact is that Americans ate more meat, bought more shoes, and used more gasoline and electricity than they did before Hitler invaded France despite rationing. And they did that while providing 1 in every 4 meals the Brits ate and providing enough food to the USSR to prevent starvation of both their soliders and civilians.
Wages in the US rose by 70% over the war years and American workers were twice as productive as their German counterparts and slave labor and were 4 times more productive than the Japanese workers.
All of this sprung from a beginning economy that was nearly 20% smaller than it had been in 1929. But which by the end of 1942, just 13 months after Pearl Harbor, was already exceeding the output of any of the other major combatants. If not for the Aluminum that the US supplied the USSR and UK neither would have been able to have produced the numbers of aircraft they did.
Stalin generally had little good to say about his allies but when he met Roosevelt and Churchill at Tehran in 1943 he raised his glass and said "to American Production, without which this war would have been lost....."
The US produced 324,750 aircraft during WW II. As for ships The US alone produced 141 Aircraft carriers (the majority smaller types), 8 battleships, 807 cruisers- destroyers- destroyer escorts, 203 submarines, 52 million tons of commercial shipping including 2,710 Liberty Ships along with numerous large tankers. Also over 1,000 LSTs and 1,000s upon 1,000s of smaller vessels. By 1945 the output of the US in all of the above exceeded the output of the rest of the nations in the world combined. The US supplied 88,410 tanks, tank destroyers and self propelled guns, 257,000 artillery pieces, 2.4 million trucks and 2.6 million machine guns and the 41 billion rounds of ammunition to go with all of that.
The industrial base that produced those massive quantities of materials also, unlike all other major combatants, was able to continue to produce adequate consumer goods at the same time. Despite the rationing of tires, meats and certain other things, and the lack of Automobile manufacturing, compared to the economies of the UK, USSR, and Germany, Italy, and Japan who had completely turned their economies to war production, the US was a cornucopia of consumer goods. The US had actually only converted just over 47% of it's economy to war production in 1944 compared to 60% for the UK and the GErmans and Soviets were well above the UKs level in that respect. Fact is that Americans ate more meat, bought more shoes, and used more gasoline and electricity than they did before Hitler invaded France despite rationing. And they did that while providing 1 in every 4 meals the Brits ate and providing enough food to the USSR to prevent starvation of both their soliders and civilians.
Wages in the US rose by 70% over the war years and American workers were twice as productive as their German counterparts and slave labor and were 4 times more productive than the Japanese workers.
All of this sprung from a beginning economy that was nearly 20% smaller than it had been in 1929. But which by the end of 1942, just 13 months after Pearl Harbor, was already exceeding the output of any of the other major combatants. If not for the Aluminum that the US supplied the USSR and UK neither would have been able to have produced the numbers of aircraft they did.
Stalin generally had little good to say about his allies but when he met Roosevelt and Churchill at Tehran in 1943 he raised his glass and said "to American Production, without which this war would have been lost....."