South China Sea and China (2011-2017)

[Ken White]

Are you sure that's true? It takes a long time to get production lines built and up to speed, even back then. In mid-43 everything was already in place and beginning to ramp up. We were already totally serious. The Navy checked the Japanese with ships that were almost all launched before the start of the war. The services knew war with Japan was coming and built up as best they could early. We were better men then than we are now but even then we couldn't turn it on all that fast.

I think ( ??? ) you said what I said.

Yes, it takes a long time to get production line up to speed -- 1939/1940 to 1943/1944 is three to five years anyway you count the start and end.

Yes, by 1943 everything was in place and totally serious. Before that things were coalescing and production was ramping up and most everyone was getting more serious by the day -- but it was 1943 before the Draft picked up almost everyone, the WPB controlled civilian employment in war industries, rationing was extended to most items and the services had learned that incompetent commanders had to be rapidly relieved and uniformly did that. All the efforts of many people from 1939 until then culminated in a reasonably good and serious effort by most Americans and the Nation by late 1943.

Not so on the Navy, a lot of the pre-war ships were lost for some good and bad reasons. The Navy was very slow in getting ready for WW II. In fact, the Maritime Adminsitration with its 1936 shipbuilding standardization and building plan was ahead of the Navy and helped the Navy get their late 1939 plan going and that only because it became obvious there was going to be a war and Franklin was adamant that we be involved. The only big class building and arriving prior to the war that fought heavily in the Pacific was the Gleaves Class and they weren't the best destroyers around, That 1939 plan saw the Fletchers, Clevelands, Baltimores, South Dakotas and Essexes but they didn't start arriving in the fleet until mid 1942 as didThe Atlantas and the Independence class CVLs (which FDR had to browbeat the Navy into ordering; then as now, they wanted BIG Carriers -- more people, thus bigger budget slice...). Most of the program didn't hit the fleet until '44. The Navy effectively won in the Pacific with those 1939 Program ships while most of the pre-war ships were assigned to the Atlantic Fleet where the combat was far less demanding. Also note the Navy and the Marines knew war with Japan was coming and prepared for it as best they could -- and that only seriously after 1939 and even then slowly. The Army OTOH did not want war with Japan and tried to ignore the Pacific...

You're correct that we didn't turn it on all that fast and that we couldn't even do that well today -- except for aircraft and some other stuff; certainly not for ships, tanks, artillery and the like, though...