MUNITIONS.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume LXIX, Issue 14464, 22 December 1915, Page 5

MUNITIONS.

LLOYD GEORGE'S STATEMENT.

BRITAIN'S ENORMOUS SUPPLIES. (Received Wednesday, at 8,5 a.m) LONDON, Tuesday. The Hon D. Lloyd George (Minister of Munitions), speaking in the House of Commons, made a statement concerning the manufacture of munitions in England. He said that it was six months since the Hon. H. H Ascmith (Prime Minister) had invited him to take over the work of supervising the output of munitions. He had been instructed to increase the supplies in order to lessen the losses in attacking perilous positions Previously what we stinted in material we squandered in lives, The shortage of shell was known to our troops and the enemy, but neither knew how really short we were in some very essential particulars. Military experts had believed that the days of high explosives were numbered except in regard to siege guns, and it was considered that shrapnel was the only weapon for field warfare. The British were reluctant converts to the conclusion that a very substantial proportion of high explosives were essential to success in trench warfare. Experts now believe that it is necessary that half of the shells should be high explosives, but came to the conclusion too late to prevent a shortage of shells at the'beginning of the year. The Ministry of Munitions erected buildings to supplement the works of private firms. The Ministry organised forty local ammunition committees in important engineering centres, and had also put up national shell factories which were a conspicuous success. We were not only increasing our supply of munitions, but we were minimising the labour difficulties and enabling the Government to check prices. The result had been that last week the factories turned out three times as much high explosives and shells as all the arsenals in the United Kingdom did in the month of May. . ._._.,_■ The quantity of shell fired in the operations in September was enormous The battle lasted for weeks, yet there was no shortage of this ammunition As the result of four months of careful husbanding the whole •was replaced in a month, and soon we will be in a position to replace it in a single week. ' The position regarding medium guns and howitzers was thoroughly satisfactory. Up to midsummer this year big guns had not been ordered on a large scale. , '■'.__, _. _ , Considerable reductions had been effected in prices of raw materials, and there had been an aggregate saving of about £20,000,000 by the Department securing control of the metal market. .. Mr Lloyd George told an astonished House that it was not until Mr Asquith visited the trenches in June that tho overwhelming importance of machine guns was realised. One of the first things was the multiplying of the output of machine guns. A new factory to produce smaller guns had been equipped. Two new factories had been erected to turn out a new type of machine gun, and as a result the delivery would be increased fivefold. The output of rifles had vastly increased. Trench mortars were a new development, but the output of grenades had increased forty times. __'___, The cost of the eighteen-pounder ammunition had been reduced 40 per cent and others proportionately.

They wanted labour to man all the factories. Machines for unakiag machine guns were idle for the lack of men. He stated that if he could get skilled men where they were wanted, the problem of the war would be solved. For the new factories he wanted 80,000 skilled and 300,000 unskilled workmen. He had heard talk of over-ordering- and- overproduction. Nothing was mote mischievous than this talk. They could talk of over-ordering when they had as much as the Germans. A good margin was a wise insurance—less than enough was foolish extravagance. What we spared in money we spilled in blood. In no war ever fought had the preponderance of machinery-been so completely established. The German successes were almost entirely due to mechanical preponderance achieved at the beginning of the war. We had appointed a number of hustlers to visit factories and find what was wrong and set it right, and press forward contracts. The net result was an increase in the delivery of old orders by 60 per cent. Two emergency factories for filling had been erected in six weeks—a fine piece of hustling. Mr Thomas, who went to America, reported that Mr Pierpont Morgan had saved Britain millions by preventing the inflation of prices. He had a remarkable photograph of the Loos battlefield, showing barbed wire imdestroyed and only one machine-gun emplacement damaged. Every soldier says that there was only one way of doing it—give them enough ammunition to crush every enemy trench and every complete emplacement, shatter every machine gun and rend every yard of entanglements. If the enemy wants to resist, they must then do it in the open. In conclusion he appealed to employers and workmen not to have "too late" inscribed on the portals of the workshops. The fatal words of this war were "too late" moving here, "too late" arriving"there, "too late" coming to this decision, "too late starting that enterprise, and "too late" preparing. The footsteps of th. Allies were dogged with the mocking spectre of "too late." Unless we .quicken our movements, damnation will fall on our sacred cause, wherefore so much of our gallant blood has flown Victory depends on the employer and worker alike. It is a question of whether we are going to force the war victoriously to an end during next year, or linger along the blood-stained path for years.