The Bill

At 7:30 one morning last week two squadrons of heavy Blenheim and Wellington bombers soared out of Midland mists and headed for France. Fully loaded, cruising at 6,000 feet under sealed orders, they crossed the Channel to Le Havre, turned due south. At nine o'clock eight more squadrons of medium Hampden and Battle bombers left England to touch the French coast near the mouth of the Somme, pass west of Paris. At eleven two more squadrons of heavy bombers followed the path of the first. By noon some 150 English warplanes, carrying 400 men, were hovering over France; heavy bombers had passed the steel mills of Bordeaux, toward which other squadrons were speeding; medium bombers had circled Orleans, passed Le Mans on their way back to Cherbourg and home. At 2 p. m. the first squadrons of Blenheims and Wellingtons were at their airports; five minutes later the lighter bombers landed.

That was the performance, ending when the last planes grounded at 5 p. m.--flawless from the point of view of Royal Air Force officers who wanted training flights to France; reassuring to French householders who saw the planes descend to 3,000 feet to give them a better look; cheering to Englishmen, who were informed by their newspapers that an equidistant flight over Germany would have taken the planes past Berlin, Hamburg, the Krupp works at Essen; irritating to Germans, whose newspapers screamed "war-mongering." Before popular enthusiasm for the performance ebbed, Sir John Simon, Chancellor of the Exchequer, presented the House of Commons with the bill--not for the flight alone, but for British rearmament which had been so hearteningly dramatized. In his low and unemotional voice Sir John admitted that his estimates for the defense budget last April had been wrong. Defense would not cost $3,140,000,000. The bill would run somewhat above $3,650,000,000--a little matter of $510,000,000 more than had been calculated. Since last year's defense budget was $2,000,000,000, this represented an increase of 80%.

Army. But this time Britons could see that the money was being spent for something. Increase for the Army--which gets $1,136,305,000--was announced appropriately as young conscripts spent their last day at home, before they set out for six months' training. Few of the 30,000 20-year-old militiamen -- first of 200,000 drafted--had ever been away from home for more than a fortnight, found little heel-clicking or saluting at camps, were informally introduced to their officers, given a razor, shaving brush, comb, toothbrush and a post card, ordered to drop their families a note saying they arrived safely.

Air. Increase in the Air Force budget to $1,303,134,000 was announced to the accompaniment of plans for more mass training flights to France, rumors of flights to Poland, an increase in the Air Force of 32,000 men, bringing the total enrollment in that branch of the service to 150,000.

Navy. Same day that Sir John announced increases in the defense budget, Prime Minister Chamberlain announced that at month's end the naval reserve would be mobilized. That meant 12,000 of the Navy's 50,000 reserve officers and men would spend two months on the 20 cruisers, 50 destroyers, 20 submarines and 40 other vessels that make up Great Britain's naval reserve fleet. Taking part in what is virtually a test mobilization, naval reservists are to be reviewed by King George, then participate with the British Home Fleet in war games, probably in the North Sea. Since regular Army reserves and territorials as well as conscripts will then be in camp (bringing the number of men under arms in the land forces to 750,000), and since the Army and the Royal Air Force will hold combined operations with the augmented Home Fleet, war breaking out in the summer months would find Great Britain at the peak of her military and naval strength.

All this costs money. As Sir John admitted his $510,000,000 underestimate, supplementary budget estimates disclosed that Great Britain would spend another $1,500,000 on propaganda, $550,000 of it for the Foreign Office's new Publicity Department (which will become a full-grown Ministry of Information in the event of war), $750,000 for the British Council, which among other duties, ships out British lecturers and entertains visitors, $200,000 for the salaries and expenses of the seventy staff members of the future Ministry of Information. All told, for ships, conscripts, propaganda, information, war planes, pilots, publicity, civilian defense, Britain is spending about $10,000,000 daily. Similar per capita expenditure on arms by the U. S. would lift its annual defense expenditures from its present $1,783,000,000 to about $10,000,000,000. But Britons beamed at Sir John's staggering figures, convinced at last that rearmament is a reality.

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