Max Hastings Quotes
Russia started the war [WWI] with 5,000 guns and reserves of 5 million shells. By the end of 1914, the Czar’s factories were producing 35,000 rounds a month, but the armies at the front were sometimes using 45,000 shells a day.
In the American Civil War, civilian weapons production first became a factor in the outcome of a war. In WWI, it became a significant factor. And in WWII it was THE MAJOR factor when America became the “Arsenal of Democracy”. At one point, a single Ford factory was producing an entire B24 (our heaviest) bomber every single hour on a 24/7 schedule—over 600 every month.
Max Hastings, British Historian & Writer, Catastrophe: Europe Goes To War 1914, 2013
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Monnet began to use the exact phrase in Mid 1940. He almost certainly had read Sherwood’s earlier, similar phrase {624748}. However so had Presidential Aid Harry Hopkins who thought that it would be a good phrase for President Roosevelt to use to “brand” the activity of the United States. So diplomatically, Monnet was asked not to use the phrase any more, and he acceded to the request. At the end of the year, in a famous radio address, FDR used the phrase {624747}, and it has been associated with him ever since.
This was the earliest version of a variant of the great WWII propaganda phrase, “Arsenal of Democracy”. See --{624746} and {624747} for quotations related to this famous phrase.
The War Plan that the Germans had developed--{642092}—had gone awry at the battle of the Marne in late 1914.
The president had wanted to send large amounts of armament and other material to England—Lend Lease—to help stave off a German invasion. The leading military men argued against it. Conservative isolationists and Congress had prevented our own military from having enough supplies and equipment. Also the conclusion of the American military leadership of the time was that England was beyond help and would have to capitulate to Germany. Even with massive armaments they would not be able to defend themselves. Any arms that we might provide to England would then fall into German hands. Roosevelt then sent his civilian assistant, Harry Hopkins, to England to assess their ability to survive. Hopkins with no military experience told Roosevelt that with the arms and ammunition England would be able to forestall invasion. Roosevelt trusted Hopkins’ judgment and decided to arm England. Hopkins turned out to be exactly correct and the military leadership was wrong. See {642830}.
See the American ambassador’s assessment after the war began {41089}
There were military procurement problems in almost every war in which the United States has been engaged.
At the end of WWII there was much tension between Russia and the Anglo-American alliance. This plan was developed but never implemented. See {613195} for Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s description of the invasion idea.
Russia announced ballistic missile testing in response to NATO announced deployment of a missile shield across Europe. It was the first mini arms race since the fall of the Soviet Union.
Peruvian Revolutionary Group. This speech was made from prison.
After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, we declared war on Japan. Germany then declared war on the United States, and America was in the fight. But the earlier policy had been to provide weapons, food, and supplies.
“Arsenal of Democracy” is the famous FDR phrase whereby America was able to provide weapons for the other democracies to fight Fascism. At the time, the United States had the greatest manufacturing capability of the world. When Gingrich made this quotation, much manufacturing that had been done in America had moved offshore. However, one area that did not move offshore was military weapons manufacturing where the United States manufacturing capability was thriving but America was the largest arms manufacturer in the world and exported much of its weapons. This quotation is an example of a political technique called “conflation.” Gingrich took an area where there was legitimate concern about the nation’s loss of manufacturing and implied that the problem was affecting our military and defense capability as well which was not do at all. However, while most Americans knew of the manufacturing job loss, they did not know that the defense manufacturing was the strongest in the world. So they became even more alarmed at the problem of general manufacturing loss.
Sir Max Hugh Macdonald Hastings FRSL FRHistS is a British journalist and military historian, who has worked as a foreign correspondent for the BBC, editor-in-chief of The Daily Telegraph, and editor of the Evening Standard. He is also the author of numerous books, chiefly on defence matters, which have won several major awards. Hastings currently writes a bimonthly column for Bloomberg Opinion.
