Page:Scott Nearing - The Germs of War (1916).djvu/18



War business, or business war? There is nothing in a name but there is a great deal in the connection that exists between modern war and modern business.

The modern war is a business proposition.

The nation which prepares for war mobilizes munitions, materials, money and men. The experience of the past few months has showed that the hardest thing to get is munitions and the easiest thing is men.

Why are munitions so hard to get? Because in a modern war the amount of munitions consumed in a single engagement would have sufficed for an eighteenth century campaign. There have been days, during the present war, when one side at one point in one battle front has fired a quarter of a million shells per day, and continued this huge expenditure day after day. This is a greater use of ammunition than was dreamed of ten years ago, even among military experts.

The peace footing of most nations has called for a comparatively small capital invested in munition factories. The countries now at war multiplied their munitions capital many times before they were on a war basis. This sudden increase in a highly specialized industry and the economic changes necessary to meet the situation, have called into prominence a new arm of the military establishment. Today the success or failure of a war is in the hands of the "Minister of Munitions," who has leaped into a position of supreme importance.

Preparedness for war involves munition-shops, woolen-mills, and stable credit before one regiment can be put in the field. War today is largely a combination of business organization and applied science. Men are incidental. They direct the war machines. They are "cannon fodder." They play almost the same role that machine hands play in an up-to-date factory.