Warning

If war came tomorrow, where would it catch U.S. stockpiles of strategic materials? "Behind the eight ball," mourned U.S. Munitions Board Chairman Thomas J. Hargrave last week.

In two years, Hargrave told the House Appropriations Committee, the U.S. had stockpiled less than 10% of the five-year goal set as a bare minimum for one year of total war. The reasons: 1) Congress had been laggard with money (it had supplied only 9% of the needed $3 billion funds); 2) the board itself had hesitated to deprive industry of any goods in short supply. Now, said Hargrave (who is president of Eastman Kodak Co.), the time had come to think less of industry and more of national security. Said he: "Industry can afford to undergo a certain amount of detriment."

Impressed, tight-fisted John Taber's committee approved the biggest appropriation yet for Hargrave's stockpilers: $300 million for emergency use, $300 million for long-term contracting. Though Congress approved, Hargrave still had $2.5 billion to go if the five-year program was to be completed on schedule (by 1951).

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