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Show Washington, D. C. BOMBER OUTPUT Though not announced by the White House, two impelling factors were behind the President's sensational sensa-tional letter to Secretary Stimson asking for an immediate Increase In the monthly output of bombers. One was the obvious need of providing pro-viding Britain with more and bigger big-ger planes to carry the offensive to Germany. Second, known only to inside authorities, was Intelligence information that the Nails are increasing in-creasing the bomber force of their Luftwaffe. The reports are that the German air force now consists of the following: Six main air fleets, each comprising compris-ing 1,000 bombers, 625 fighters and 75 reconnaisance planes, a total of 10.200. Also there is an Independent air unit of 2,750 planes, a naval air service of 1,000, an operational training train-ing unit of 650. and a transport organization or-ganization of 3,500 planes. In addition addi-tion to these first-line ships, is a reserve of 12.000 others, plus 9,000 trainers and transports. Grand total: About 35,000 planes. German airplane production capacity ca-pacity is estimated at 3,000 planes a month, including about 500 bombers. However, except for bombers, Germany Ger-many is not now using her full production pro-duction capacity as she doesn't need that many new planes a month. Nazi March production is estimated estimat-ed at 2,200 ships of all types, but only 1,600 in April. In May, how-ever, how-ever, Intelligence reports are that Nazi plane production is being stepped up to replace Balkan and North African losses. Reports are vague about what the Nazis are doing with the nine government gov-ernment and eleven private aircraft plants In France, most of them located lo-cated In the occupied zone; also regarding re-garding the eight Dutch factories, including the Fokker works, and the seventeen Belgian plants. These plants have large potential producing capacity, but best information infor-mation is that the Nazis are stripping strip-ping them of their machine tools and other equipment. How much this will boost the Nazis' 3,000 planes a month is only a guess. U. S. Goal. Weakest link in German plane production is aluminum. From captured cap-tured planes, the British estimate that the Nazis use about 500 pounds of this vital metal per ship. The American average is 5,000 pounds. The undisclosed bomber goal of 1941 to which Roosevelt referred in bis letter to Stimson, is 600 a month. The four new assembly plants in Omaha, Tulsa, Kansas City and Fort Worth should produce about 300 bombers a month. To double their output it will be necessary to build and equip at least as many new plants, plus taking over an increased in-creased ratio of automobile and other oth-er plant facilities to turn out the necessary nec-essary parts. The letter which OPM Director General Knudsen sent auto makers that they will have to hold down their 1942 car production to 78.3 per cent of this year's output. Is considered con-sidered only a beginning. Insiders predict that there will be another big cut soon. LATIN ADMIRALS The state department scored a ten-strike when it finally persuaded the navy to invite the chiefs of Latin American navies to visit the United States. The Junket definitely carried weight. For the United States navy, without any ifs, ands or buts, is the most powerful in the world, and the thing that counts in South America today is the belief that this country can really ward off Nazi invasion. Behind the scenes, the man who helped most to dress the stage for Latin American admirals was Johnny John-ny Thomason, better known for bis prolific pen portraits of the marines (Red Pants, Fix Bayonets, Jeb Stuart, Salt Winds and Gobi Dust). Thomasor. now a colonel in the marines, had served in Latin America, Amer-ica, knew the importance of the admirals' ad-mirals' visit Other U. S. brass hats didn't Admiral Harold Stark, chief of naval operations, fumed and fretted, fret-ted, only wanted to show the Good Neighbors a few East coast stations. At this point Johnny Thomason remarked: re-marked: "This visit is giving you a pain in the neck. How about letting me take it over?" Thomason insisted that the trip was important enough to do it right, demanded more entertainment money from the White House and got It At first he worked on the idea of meeting the admirals with U. S. cruisers at Barranquilla, Colombia, Co-lombia, taking them out to the mid-Atlantic mid-Atlantic to view the U. S. naval patrol pa-trol at work. This was given up as too long, and a coast-to-coast inspection in-spection of U. S. naval stations was ! substituted. MERRY-GO-ROUND The G.O.P.-controlled Kansas legislature hit Rep. Jack Houston, long Kansas Democrat, with everything every-thing but the waterbucket in gerrymandering gerry-mandering his district but he takes it philosophically. "When a salesman sales-man makes good on the job," he says with a grin, "his territory is increased." in-creased." U. S. military Intelligence places the number of German panzer divisions divi-sions at not over 20 out of a total of 260 divisions. |