Army And Navy – Navy’s 31 Billions

Passed by the House last week was a $6,237,000,000 appropriation bill, of which the Navy gets the largest slice: $5,595,000,000—almost four billion of it for air. Main item is $2,862,000,000 for 14,600 airplanes, assuring the Navy of its 27,500 “program airplanes” early in 1944. About $36,000,000 is for 72 blimps, raising the blimp patrol total to 120.

In addition, the bill gives the Navy the right to enter into contracts amounting to $9,500,000,000 for vessels authorized last July: 500,000 tons of aircraft carriers, 500,000 tons of cruisers, 900,000 tons of destroyers and destroyer escort craft, 200,000 tons of auxiliary vessels (some to be bought and converted), 1,000 small craft.

Appropriation and contractual authority in the bill increases the money available to the Navy in 1943 to almost $31,000,000,000. The total allotted to national defense since June 1940 is now $222,000,000,000—equivalent to all the income of all the people of the U.S. in three pre-war years.