LEASE-LEND AID

Waikato Times, Volume 131, Issue 21834, 15 September 1942, Page 4

LEASE-LEND AID

AMERICA’S GREAT PART ALLIES’ URGENT NEEDS (Official Wireless) (Received Sept. 15. 3.15 p.m.) RUGBY, Sept. 14 . -Gte value of the lend-iease deliveries for the. eighteen months from March, 1941, to August. 1942, totalled 5,129,000,000 dollars, and it is now being administered at the rate of 8,000,000,000 dollars annually. This information was given by President Roosevelt in a message to Congress. Mr Roosevelt said that Britain, China and Russia, from the beginning, had carried on without enough guns, tanks or planes. It was through their uphill fight that the war had not been lost. “Only by strengthening our Allies and combining their strength with ours can we surely win,” added the President. Mr Roosevelt gave a warning that only by stripping civilian economy to the bone could the maximum production necessary to ensure victory be achieved. So far the United States had little more than passed the halfway mark towards maximum production. “We and the other United Nations need all the weapons all of us can produce, ’ he said. “In relation to their available resources Britain and Russia have up to now produced more weapons than we have and they are continuing to produce to the limit, despite the fact that Russia is a battleground and Britain an offensive base.” The President’s report said that at present about 35 per cent of the lend-lease exports were going to the United Kingdom, 35 per cent to Russia. and 30 per cent to the Middle East, Australia and other areas, including China. The report added that aid to China had been limited by the difficulty of transport, but the development of other means of transportation would relieve this situation. Reciprocal lend-lease had become a very material and important aspect of our supply problem and this represented the most economical use of the United Nations’ war resources. Feeding Starving Millions Details of how the United States would be able to feed the starving peoples of Europe once victory was attained are contained in an announcement by the United States Department of Agriculture in connection with Mr Roosevelt’s lend.ea.se report. The report stated that Liberty cargo ships, now under construction at the rate of three daily, would be able in a single trip to bring to Europe nearly 800 eggs for each inhabitant of Europe. Each trip of these ships could supply Europe with a full year’s supply of milk. Each trip could bring a ton of meat for each inhabitant, based on the raw weight of the product. The dehydration of foodstuffs was solving the great problem of transport. Dehydration was the answer to the problem of getting lend-lease food the Allies and of supplying the American expeditionary forces and feeding the liberated peoples of Europe after the United Nations’ victory. The experimental cargo vessel Seamobile was described as being virtually immune to torpedo attack because it could ride so high in the water that the torpedoes would pass under it. It is, also argued that it would be inexpensive, since only gasoline motors are used and it could be mass produced. The experiments were inconclusive when the first full-sized Sea Otter type was built and disclosed defects which called for re-designing. Report to President Mr A. Harriman, Mr Roosevelt’s lend-lease adviser, returned to London yesterday from a visit to Washington, during which he reported to the President on his visit to Moscow and the Middle East.