Show ECONOMIC highlights industrial news review in a recent issue life spoke of americas chronic and catastrophic complacency that memorable phrase accurately illustrates what has been wrong with this country we were told that we could lick the japanese in a matter of weeks and we believed it we were told that the potential enemy was short on raw materials and natural resources and so were incapable of an extended offensive and we believed that too we were told that the oceans were in effect fortifications which were certain to protect our shores in any extremity and we also believed that and so the inevitable happened we and our government terribly underestimated alil material strength and striking power of the foe we thought in terms of national defense instead of in terms of war we turned our faces face away from the unpleasant facts and dreamed happy dreams of victory only lately have the american people and their government come to realize how hard it will be to win this war how much work we must do if we are to escape the fate of france and the other subjugated countries which the conquerors are literally using as slave markets it does not serve the national interest terest to minimize the disasters which have befallen the united nations darls in less than four months ja pan has ha attained mastery of the pacific and is in moving av ing on australia she may turn at any minute teon on india which is populated with 29 per cent of the entire worlds manpower is rich in resources of many kinds and is torn tom with internal antema I 1 dissension some authorities e expect act that hitler may soon attempt to drive across the middle east if that drive were successful he would I 1 make physical contact with japan and th thai e axis would be in a position to destroy vital united nations communication lines it is clear that the vichy government possessor of a large fleet is coming closer and closer to all out collaboration with the nazis there is a distinct possibility that the axis may gain preponderance of the worlds resources human and material alike in short the whole picture of the world has changed fatefully since december 7 there can be no question but what japan and her partners counted heavily on that catastrophic complacency of which life spoke and so the job of this country and the other united nations is simply that of revolutionizing our outlook toward war prid ind of producing and shipping the instruments of war necessary to make such a revolution possible every military operation I 1 based on defensive strategy has fan fail ed cd and failed with terrible losses of men and equipment and key positions sit ions if we are to win the war must musi be carried to the enemy and carried to him at the earliest bel time we could attack japans concentrated Inous industrial trial areas from alaskan or chinese bases if we had enough planes of the right kind we could crack her long extended supply line if we had sufficient c equipment quip ment at the right place these and similar is ifs arc great bottlenecks to the waging of a successful war they are not simply industrial problems which wera wem largely created by inefficiency in government and by work stoppage on the part of labor groups the american people clearly have a choice they will work harder than they ever worked in their lives or they will lose a war whose loss can have no other conclusion but the death of freedom everywhere none of the nations which are united with us in this epic struggle have the production capacity to 10 turn the scales the cools of war will come from us and in everin everin ever in creasing quantity or they will not come at all we must supply the bulk of the ships the tanks the planes the guns the shells and the and we must supply them now not in years to come |