These “Detectives” know the truth about Germany

Camp News, Volume 3, Issue 151, 4 December 1942, Page 2

These “Detectives” know the truth about Germany

(By

in the “Daily Mirror.”)

How much wool has Germany got left?. ' . How much oil has the Axis in store, and where is it getting its new supplies? How much cotton, nickel, chrome? Answer these and a hundred other questions like them and you get some idea of Germany’s available resources. The answers to those questions are vitally important. All over the world hundreds of experts have turned “detective” to discover them. Take an example. In a suburban road of a famous Yorkshire city stands a quiet pair of houses which used to be the home of two or three families. Outwardly the houses have changed little. But now they are occupied by textile experts, men and women, for whom cloth holds no mysteries. After working in their laboratories for a few hours they can tell you exactly what went into the making of any sample of bloth. Periodically parcels are delivered at the house containing uniforms and underclothing taken from German prisoners. The cloth passes under microscopes, through various instruments, is treated with chemicals. Soon a report is ready on exactly how that cloth was made. The detectives have seen through all the devices of the Nazis' to make their wool go further. They record exactly .what ( proportion of pure wool, what proportion of viscose and what proportion of cotton went into the manufacture of the cloth. Comparison of these records made at intervals since the war began, tells the stories. The Nazis rightly believe the fighting services should have the best of everything. The Germany soldier used to get uniforms made of 100 per cent. wool. Then as the war went'on the proportion of wool dropped to 70 per cent. Then to 65 per —the rest of the fibres being cotton. • Perhaps it has dropped further. The experts naturally are not going to tell. How much of the Nazis’ secrets they know is their secret. The way articles are made may also reveal secrets to the experts. Socks that have constantly been re-footed, for instance, tell the detective a tale.

Of course, total war calls for economies. But there are the economies made on purpose, and the economies to which you are driven because of shortage of materials. In a sense they are false economies, because what they save in materials they waste in man power. If the British blockade does nothing else, it forces the Germans to spend millions of man-hours a year on producing synthetic yarns and synthetic fuels,. They are not going to substitute cotton for wool, viscose for cotton unless they have to. ' When the expert finds tiny scraps of cloth being used for facing Army uniforms, he can draw conclusions. Like uniforms socks and underclothes, everything else captured provides clues for detectives. A German prisoner is brought in wounded. A bandage has been applied. When his wound is treated, the dressing does not always go into the incinerator. • Samples go to the analysts. Interesting facts are found this way. For instance, bandages and dressings on German soldiers on the Russian front have been coming from France, the Balkans and other places. A few days ago, an R.A.F. officer, anxious to have a look at a German plane brought down in the sea off Libya, dived into 20ft. of water with a piece of railway line tied to him to keep him down. He got what he wanted and brought it to the surface for more detailed examination. * But samples are not always taken so dramatically. How valuable this work can be, was indicated in the Great War. On the entry of the U.S. in 1917, Barney Baruch wanted to make a grand analysis of German resources in this way. The U.S. Government wouldn’t give him the money. So Barney Baruch provided it out of his own pocket—£2s,ooo for a quick look round German samples. . Three commissioners made reports. They ended up by giving a forecast of the date the war would end. All of them guessed November, 1918. One said November 11. But that, of course,, was just luck.