NATIONALIZE ARMS FACTORIES By PIERRE COT (former French Minister for
Air)
(Major J. W. Hills, M.P., will write next week against the nationalization of arms factories.) THE suppression of the private manufacture of arms appears to me a wise and sound operation. In the first place the nationalization of the industry would dispel that sinister atmosphere which thickens round us every day. I am a Member of the French Parliament. Tomorrow, it may be, I shall be asked to vote credits for more war material. I am anxious that my judgement should be unfettered. In that case it must not run the risk of being misled by interested campaigns or by the publication in certain papers of documents more or less falsified. I may be genuinely deceived in my appreciation of facts, but I am bound to drive from my mind, as a simple matter of conscience, any risk of mistake which I can discern in advance. This may be derided as an excess of scruple. It is nothing of the kind. Numbers of Members of Parliament will say the same thing- The motive in some cases will be personal integrity, in others a fear of their electors and anxiety not to expose themselves to the reproach of having been taken in. In short, national defence must be free from the preoccupa- tions and complications of private interest. That is the first reason in favour of the nationalization of arms manufacture.
My second argument is based on the excessive cost of private manufacture. Comparisons have been drawn between the two systems in many States. They have shown the manifest advantage of State manufacture to the public finances. How can that be ? The question presents itself inevitably, for as a general rule the State is a poor manufacturer and a bad merchant. In the case of arms manufacture appeal is made to private industry when there is no way of doing without it. That happens when State arsenals are either non-existent or inadequate. A nervous public opinion may compel a Government to proceed as a matter of urgency to an increase of its armaments ; orders have to be given rapidly ; their execution has to be speeded-up. These are admirable conditions for the arms-manufacturers. They are in demand. They can therefore exact high prices. And they can do that the more easily in that competition has almost disappeared. The revelations made before Senator Nye's Commission in the United States have confirmed what was widely suspected. Understandings exist between arms-manufacturers. Veritable zones of influence are reserved to such and such a firm. We need not be astonished that a wide gap exists between the prices. of private industry and State arsenal prices.
In the course of the year 1933, at the instance of the Daladier Government, the French Ministry of Finance undertook a study of this question. It was sought to discover whether the French Treasury could, without incurring excessive charges, buy up and nationalize the private manufacture of arms. M. Georges Bonnet was Finance. Minister, and he reached the conclusion that the acquisition was possible without laying any extra burden at all upon the French taxpayer. M. Georges Bonnet contemplated meeting the costs of acquisition through the issue of Treasury bonds ; a similar system had been employed by the French State to liquidate part of the commitments involved in the reconstruction of the liberated areas. Interest and amortization of these bonds would have been largely covered by the economies achieved in the arms-market, with the result, that without extra expense the State would have become the owner of valuable factories, and thereby have brought off an excellent bargain. That, it is true, is not the main reason for the nationalization of the arms manufacture, but it is not irrelevant to emphasize the fact that the mere financial interest of the State points to nationalization. The military interest of the State points in the same direction. There are those who say the regime of private manufacture admits in time of war of the production of vast quantities of arms and munitions when they are urgently needed. Nothing seems to me more mistaken.. Nothing seems more opposed to all the lessons of the last war., Nothing is more contrary to everything my tenure of the post of French Minister of Air taught me. During the War of 1914-1918 it was necessary to lay under requisition the whole of the national industry. In our country, as in that of all the belligerents, a Ministry of Munitions was created. This Ministry was a vast indus- trial organization. It received orders from the consuming departments. It assured the execution of these orders, itself allotting the raw materials, labour and credits. In reality the manufacturers were mere instruments of execution. Their initiative was closely limited. It did not in fact exceed that enjoyed by an engineer or head of a department in a great business undertaking.
What was true yesterday would be even more true tomorrow. A new war would compel every State to take into its own hands the direction of its arms and munitions manufacture. But in that case why not do it in time of peace ? And if the State makes itself responsible for the risks and undertakes the general supervision, why not nationalize out and out ? Because, we shall be told, the industries that will be working in time of war for national defence could not be sufficiently employed on war manu- facture in time of peace. To ensure their commercial existence they would need to have other outlets. Such and such a manufacturer of guns will be making not only guns but also steel bridges or rails. Such and such a constructor of aeroplanes will be producing civil air- craft. On the day of mobilization the State will find them ready. By producing a few guns and a few military aeroplanes they will have gained the necessary experience in time of peace. We need private manufacture of arms, we are told, in order to be able at a given moment to transform it into public manufacture. So runs the argument most frequently adduced in opposition to the suppression of private manufacture. I believe this argu- ment to be completely false, and for the following reasons.
To be able to assure their war production in case of need all States plan their industrial mobilization in advance. Everywhere, secretly or openly, plans are drawn up by the General Staffs. I cannot imagine a single General Staff that would ignore this capital pro- blem. These plans are more or less complete. They rest on an inventory of the economic and industrial resources of the country. A chart of the " war potential " is con- structed. It is on the basis of this potential that the plans of industrial mobilization are framed. Groups, or " families," of factories arc constituted. These groups in time of war will work together. One factory will provide the raw material, another the halPfinished products ; another will proceed to the assembly of parts and con- struction. These groups radiate round a central factory which is the real matrix and which, as a rule, is responsible for the assembly and construction. These matrices are usmully represented by a factory which in peace time has worked for national defence. Let us take an example, In time of peace a particular aeroplane factory produces the entire aeroplane. In time of war it will be responsible only for the most delicate task namely the final con- struction of the aeroplane and the production of a few parts ; but it will receive in the form of finished products all the parts whose assembly will create the aeroplane. These parts will be produced in the factories or group of factories best qualified by their peace-time production for their construction. There is no need to pursue this demonstration further. Everyone realizes how much more effectively and accurately industrial mobilization could be planned if these factories, the master-units of the group, were State factories. That is self-evident. It is no use telling us that private industry is needed for industrial mobilization. Such a proposition is at the same time, true and false ; true, in that private factories manufacturing no munitions in time of peace figure,in the plan of industrial mobilization; false, in that the master- units in the industrial mobilization are formed by munition-factories and that it would be to the general interest to nationalize such factories.
From whatever angle it be examined, the problem of the manufacture of- arms -is simple. The interest of the State is to suppress private manufacture. That is 'true from a financial point of view ; it is equally true from a military. I would add that it is even more true; from a moral point of view—and that consideration is ;to my mind decisive. ,
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