Destructive Creation: American Business and the Winning of World War II (American Business, Politics, and Society)

This is an excellent book on the industrial mobilization of the US economy in World War II. It especially describes the sometimes tense relationships between private industrial companies and government regulators, the War Production Board (WPB), the Office of Price Administration (OPA), and program managers in the Army, Navy, and the Maritime Commission.The book also describes the immense involvement of the Federal government in the US industrial and manufacturing economy during the War. At the end of the war in 1945, the US government owned 20% of the entire industrial and manufacturing plant in the country. Some specific examples are:• Enriched uranium and plutonium processing : 100%;• Synthetic rubber: 97%;• Aircraft production: 89%;• Ships: 87%;• Non-ferrous metals (aluminum and magnesium): 58%;• Chemicals and explosives: 43%;• Aviation gasoline: 33%.These plants were divided into government owned / Contractor operated (GOCO) and government owned government operated (GOGO). The book describes the immense propaganda effort put forth by private companies and assorted politically conservative organizations to make it seem like the private companies were winning the production war when that was definitely not the case. Furthermore, the industrial facilities directly managed by the government (usually by the Army or the Navy) were very efficient in their productivity.Some other very good books on the US military – industrial economy during WW II are:• “A Call to Arms: Mobilizing America for World War II” by Klein (2013). This is an outstanding, thorough book on the way by which the US economy was mobilized for WW II. Most of the discussion is on the various federal government agencies and personalities that coordinated the effort. It's definitely a Big Government point of view. It describes the successes and failures, the efficiencies and mis-coordinations, the warts and the shining moments. It also describes the good and ill contributions of labor unions and big business.• “Freedom’s Forge: How American Business Produced Victory in World War II” by Herman (2012). This is an excellent book describing the role of American business in the military-industrial production efforts of WW II. In my opinion, it is a bit over the top in its praise. Don't get me wrong -- I think the US industry was far and away the most efficient of all the countries involved in the war. All that effort was coordinated by (gasp!) the Federal government. The horde of companies and factories didn't coordinate and administer themselves and didn't set production priorities on their own.A good book on the various national wartime economies of all the powers is “The Economies of World War II” by Harrison (1998). It's on par with books by Tooze and Overy on this subject. And what's nice is that it compares the military industrial economies of all six major powers: USA, Great Britain, USSR, Germany, Japan, and Italy.Some very good books on other nations’ wartime economies are:Germany:• “The Wages of Destruction” by Tooze (2008). This is the ultimate book on the war economy of the Third Reich.• “Design for Total War” by Carroll (1968). This is an excellent discussion of the German military industrial and economy before and during World War II. The book gives a thorough explanation of the organizational chaos that permeated the entire war industrial effort. I thought that Chapter X "How Warlike a War Economy" and Chapter XIII " Total War: the Prophecy Fulfilled" were the most interesting. Chapter XI "Mobilization, 1939: A War of Each Against All" describing the dysfunctional military and civilian organizations for war industry and economy and their collective inability to establish priorities is also fascinating if not astounding.USSR:• “The Soviet Economy and the Red Army 1930 – 1945” by Dunn (1995). This is an excellent book on the subject. I have seen that the material contained in it is used / cited in many other books on the development of Soviet armored forces and associated military industry. You can get much of the information contained in this book regarding tank development, army organization, and military industrialization from the following books at much lower prices, even buying all of them: "Stalin's Keys to Victory" and "Hitler's Nemesis" both by the same author as this book (Walter Dunn). I found several chapters in this book quite fascinating and containing much original information: Chapter 3 "Logistics" describes the very different supply organization and system used by the Soviets; Chapter 7 "Artillery", Chapter 8 "Anti - Tank Guns", Chapter 9 "The Railroads", and Chapter 10 "Motor Transport" contained information and points of view I had never read before.• “Guns and Rubles: The Defense Industry in the Stalinist State” by Harrison (2008). This is a dry but interesting study of the development of the Soviet military industrial complex in the 1920s and 1930s. It describes the creation and evolution of the Ministries or Commissariats, main directorates, and the overall bureaucracy for managing the military industrial system. It also discusses the inefficiencies that were built into the system from the very beginning. It gives some idea of the frustrations that were experienced: for example, trying to build fairly complex monocoque metal airplanes with a labor force consisting largely of peasant workers two or three years removed from the fields, an inexperienced management trying to produce things with little or no control over its suppliers, and intense pressure from above to do the impossible with inadequate resources. The fascinating part of the story, I felt, was that the old Soviet Union started out from scratch and managed to create an arms industry in World War II that performed better than that of their German opponents. The nice thing about this book is that it is based on information obtained from Soviet archives opened for research in the 1980s and 1990s -- no ideological biases or semi - informed speculations here.• “Accounting for War: Soviet Production, Employment, and the Defense Burden 1940 – 1945” by Harrison (1996). This is a dry but detailed book with much statistical data on Soviet war production and industrial productivity.Japan:• “Japan’s Economy in War and Reconstruction” by Cohen (1949). This is the ultimate book on the Japanese economy from about 1930 to 1948. It discusses every aspect of the economy: steel, shipping and shipbuilding, aircraft, oil, chemicals and munitions, electric power, coal mining, agriculture, textiles, labor, finance both in text and in tabular data form. The book also compares the performance of the Japanese economy to the economies of the US, Britain, and Germany in terms both in absolute numbers and in terms of labor efficiency. The Japanese came out a distant third no matter now you look at it. I think this is the primary source of information on the Japanese war economy as I have seen it referenced frequently in other books.• “Japan’s Economic Planning and Mobilization inn Wartime, 1930s – 1940s” by Miwa (2015). This is a fairly good book on the subject of Japanese economic mobilization before and during WW II but is marred by considerable text repetition (especially in Part I). There are, I believe, considerable issues with illogical statements and then purported conclusions. There is some discussion that the industrialization plans were almost all developed and administered by the Army. But the Army had almost no one who possessed any education or experience running factories or administering an economy at the national level. Civilians who had experience in running large factories and industrial businesses were not involved in developing these war industry mobilization plans or in administering them. Chapter 2 in Part I at least gives some hints of the totally superficial efforts in which the Japanese military engaged when attempting strategic military and economic planning. Page 118 contains the following statement: “…The Basic Outline of Operations stated that the Imperial Army, following the Basic National Defense Plan, must do its best to resolve disputes promptly through preemptive actions that involved Army-Navy cooperation.” This is a military – industrial operations Plan? This sort of thing is amateurish compared to what the US, Britain, USSR and even Germany developed for economic mobilization and for waging war.Britain:• “Britain’s War Machine” by Edgerton (2011). A little over the top in terms of presenting the idea that everything was wonderful about Britain's industrial effort regarding aircraft, tanks, ship building, and so forth. For a more balanced view on British tank design and manufacture (for example) see “Death by Design” by Peter Beale and “Blood, Sweat, and Arrogance” by Gordon Corrigan. None the less, it does present a good alternative to the traditional historical view that Germany was the ultimate technical and industrial leader in the war.

Hi was hoping this to be about the building if airplanes, ships, and tanks. It is not.This book covers all the government agencies and government actions used to create the factories that industry used.About the only interesting thing was how many military-factory workers were repeatedly laid off, due to all these overlapping bureaucracies constantly changing their priorities. Crazy levels of Red Tape.As a Veteran told me "from what I saw, the country that can afford the most waste, wins"No I still have to find a book on the manufacturing miracle of WW2. Any recommendations?

This is an exceedingly balanced study of the industrial mobilization in the U.S. during World War II. It neither extols nor demonizes the captains of industry, who often fought against government rules and ownership, but in the end, they produced the weapons of war that won the conflict. Yet government oversight was also necessary, and the military had to supplement American private industry to fully arm the nation. Any serious study of American national security must include a thorough examination of how the military acquires the weapons of war, and for World War II, this study is the benchmark.

This is an excellent book for those interested in the industrial effort to win WWII. Others include War Lords of Washington by Bruce Catton, Arsenal of Democracy by Donald Nelson, The Arsenal of Democracy by A. J. Baime, Freedom's Forge by Arthur Herman (anti-union parts are inaccurate), Forging the Military-Industrial Complex by Gregory Hooks and Wedemyer Reports by General Wedemyer.

Great read, very informative and well researched with great detail Dr. Wilson explores the creation of the military industrial complex

Dr. Mark Wilson has authored what is likely to be a widely discussed book over a long period of time on the history of business and their interaction with the US Government during the mobilization for World War II on the American Homefront.The book is extraordinarily well written, and Wilson argues his points with outstanding evidence and lively prose. Wilson's core thesis is that American business did not act alone in providing the munitions and wartime supplies we needed to ultimately prove victorious in the war against the Axis powers. Instead, he contends, without the US Government participation in the manufacturing process, private industry may not have been able to feed the American War Machine.Wilson looks at case studies, including many of the largest contractors in the United States at that time, to explain how the government intervention allowed them to be successful in providing goods for the war effort. By studying multiple enterprises, from Boeing to General Motors, Ford to Newport News Shipbuilding, he paints a picture of government assistance in cranking up production to meet the needs.Wilson uses the acronyms GOCO (Government Owned, Contractor Operated) and GOGO (Government Owned, Government Operated) to help the reader distinguish where Uncle Sam was partnering with business to create war materiel. In many cases, as Wilson deftly demonstrates, the US Government (basically) provided the capital to build the facility, and then let private enterprise operate the facility to create the necessary supplies.Wilson also shows us how the government prevented the rise of "war millionaires" though the use of excessive profits taxes and stingy contracting. Combined with the outstanding chapter on reverting to domestic production, this book really covers the entire period of the war and does so in a remarkably thorough, yet eminently readable, way.If you're interested in the history of business, the history of war, or just a WWII aficionado, this book is a great read. Wilson even injects some unexpected characters (like Sewell Avery, CEO of Montgomery Ward, who so opposed government intervention that he stayed in his office until he was literally carried out by a pair of soldiers).