WAR SUPPLIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 8 April 1940, Page 5

WAR SUPPLIES

PASTER PRODUCTION DEMANDED BY MILITARY COMMANDERS. BRITAIN’S STRONG POSITION. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. LONDON. April 7. "The generals demand that the pace of armament production should be quickened and supplies delivered earlier,” declared the Minister of Supply, Dr Leslie Burgin, speaking at Wolverhampton. "Still the cry comes for more and more, quicker and quicker. The Allies are capable of producing limitless quantities of every type. The Ministry of Supply is spending £l,OOO 000 a day to provide the factories alone. The Home production of steel is double that'of the last war's. "Germany is beleaguered. ..Her stocks of raw materials can be listed and her supplies can be numbered, whereas the entire world is a seller of anything Britain needs. Goods can be transported anywhere because of our mastery of the seas."

Dr Burgin disclosed that a scheme was being considered for the interchange of highly specialised British and French industrial equipment.

The magnitude of the Supply Ministry’s tales was described by Dr Burgin. The Minister illustrated the work of his Ministry by asking his audience to follow in imagination a young civilian who joins the army. "Almost all the things this young man needed before he became a soldier are useless to him after joining the colours. All the things he requires as a soldier —uniforms. arms, ammunition, special cooking utensils, vehicles, guns of all kinds—all these are the task of the Ministry to provide." Dr Burgin asked the audience to consider' the immense quantity this military equipment represented when there were hundreds of thousands of men ceasing to be civilians and becoming soldiers of all branches of the Army. A vast organisation was necessary to supply this equipment, with staff of thousands of men and women who ordinarily gained their livelihood in quite different occupations. An engineer on being asked to supply a thousand medium-calibre guns would need a factory site, new buildings, machine-tools, a skilled labour force, materials and transport. "How much more these things would be required if instead of being asked to supply a thousand guns as a single item of a programme the need arose for 20.000 different items, which the Ministry is actually supplying." Dr Burgin spoke of machine-tools as being to a large extent the key to the problem of supply and he pointed out that the British tool industry before the war obtained large supplies from the United States of America, and Germany. 'lt had been necessary to place large orders overseas in order to provide for war time expansion. "Raw materials are a problem far less for us than for Germany, which is beleaguered," he continued. "Thanks to our mastery of the seas and our possession of a great mercantile marine, goods can be transported to us from anywhere in the Seven Seas, in spite of all the enemy does to endeavour to impede the steamers."