PLANES AND SHIPS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXI, Issue 97, 24 March 1941, Page 7

PLANES AND SHIPS.

•AMERICA'S VALUABLE HELP

WASHINGTON, March 22. It is understood that national defence officials, including Mr W. E. Knudsen (Defence Production Chief), advised the Senate Appropriations Sub-Committee in secret session that portion of the 7,000,000,000-dollar Lend or Lease Fund would provide Britain with 10,700 planes in the next two years, which is additional to the 11,800 Britain has ordered, of which 3400 have been delivered. The defence appropriations measure carries funds for 3600 new army bombing planes and the eventuual equipping of a 4,000,000-man army. A Maritime Commission spokesman said that approximately 400 merchantmen would be built for Britain under the Aid Act at a cost of about 1,250,000 dollars each. Additional shipyards would probably be built because the existing yards were working to capacity. The proposed vessels would probably be identical with the group of 200 freighters already authorised and for which 51 shipyards had alreadycontracted. It was expected that the first keel would be laid on April 1 and the first "vessel completed in November.