The Timaru Herald TUESDAY, JANUARY 12, 1943. GERMANY’S WINTER PROBLEMS

Timaru Herald, Volume CLIII, Issue 22477, 12 January 1943, Page 2

The Timaru Herald TUESDAY, JANUARY 12, 1943. GERMANY’S WINTER PROBLEMS

Al ll'i' beginning of the fourth winter of war, Germany’s conquests are greater than a year ago. More fertile land and more mineral resources are at the disposal ol Germany’s European war economy. In the west of Europe and in Germany itself, however, the supply of foodstuffs, raw materials and manpower has fallen; the overall production of the south-eastern countries has also declined. If Germany could reduce fighting in the winter to small scale engagements, manpower might be freed to reconstruct some of the wrecked industries in occupied Russia. Concentration in Germany itself of the most important industries manufacturing for war would then again increase the output of war material and of agricultural machinery for the occupied Russian provinces. The main problem would lie organisation. Recent German propaganda has made these points clear. By collaboration and by compulsion,' Germany will try to use continental Europe’s economic resources for a prolonged war, not only in Europe, but also in Africa and on the high seas. The question arises whether actual economic conditions on the continent. and particularly in Germany, make success in this plan probable. It is hardly likely that Germany can possibly succeed if forced to fight decisively large-scale military campaigns during the winter. A military stalemate is necessary. Moreover, some degree of political stability in occupied countries, if only stability enforced by police measures, is equally necessary. During the spring and summer of 1942, Germany’s main economic preoccupation was the final concentration of industry for war purposes and the replacement of called-up Germans by foreign workers. Every single business report and all the general economic surveys point to the fact that war output during the first six months of 1942 was at least maintained. But raw material supplies, especially coal, steel and other metals, showed unmistakable signs of being strained to the utmost. Industries catering for essential civilian requirements were forced to release workers for the war industries, and their output fell correspondingly; during the corresponding year in the last war, the quantity of civilian commodities available was incomparably greater than during 1912. At the same time, the general state of repair and replacements in all industries deteriorated considerably. The fact that Germany could draw on the industrial capacity of the whole Continent made it possible to maintain actual war production. The exhaustion of German manpower and the wearing out of German industrial installations were averted by withdrawing material resources, foodstuffs and manpower from the occupied countries. During the coming winter, western and northern Europe will come very near to actual exhaustion; and it will become very difficult to transfer more workers to Germany. The east is therefore the main reservoir for supplying Germany with labour. In numbers, the occupied Russian provinces can supply sufficient workers; but each worker withdrawn from Russia diminishes the possibilities of reconstructing agriculture and industry in occupied Russia. At tire same time, the concentration of foreign workers in Germany should soon reach saturation point for technical, as well as political, reasons. Only the profound shock and demoralisation resulting from a complete collapse of the Soviet Union would change these conditions, but it is clear now that there is not the iemotest chance of a Soviet collapse. GEORGE WASHINGTON CARVER T AST week a New York message announced the death of Dr. (leorge Washington Carver, who was described as a world-famous bacteriologist. Dr Carver was a scientist. and his speciality was chemurgy, that branch of chemistry devoted to the utilisation of raw materials, especially farm products, for industrial purposes. Dr Carver, a Negro, was the child of slave parents whom he never knew. They were borne off by slave raiders while he was an infant. He took the name of the white planter who cared for him after his parents had gone away. Dr Carver became the greatest scientist his race has produced, but he remained a simple man with a simple faith. As his work became known it would have been possible for him to have attained wealth and position in the world’s largest centres, but he preferred to remain in that part of America he knew best, Mason County, Alabama. His belief was that there could be no greener pastures than those lying nearby and this faith he reduced to a quiet philosophic formula: “Start where you are, with what you have, make something of it, never be satisfied.” Carver’s greatest service to the people was that of convincing them of the latent productive capacity of the poor soil in the southern States. Macon County, when he first began working there, like most of the South, grew cotton and little else. To save the soil and add to larm income, Carver advocated the growing of sweet potatoes and peanuts. To-day the the sweet potato is a staple product of southern farms and the peanut farmers of the South now receive about 70,000,000 dollars for their crop. His fame perhaps will rest upon his experiments with the peanut which have led to the production of more than 300 useful by-products. Among those being commercially manufactured are peanut butter and peanut flour, besides various oils and fertilisers. Carver’s achievement is that he brought a great scientific mind Io heat on the practical problems of the people whom he loved.