d adequate
supply system had been created. It was large enough and flexible enough
to permit us to make gradual accumulations of reserve as Congress from
time to time provided the necessary money; but when the mobilization of
the National Guard on the Mexican frontier took place, such reserves as
we had were rapidly consumed, and the maintenance of the military
establishment on the border required an increase which quite equaled the
entire capacity of those industries ordinarily devoting themselves to
the production of military supplies. When the present enlarged military
establishment was authorized it involved an enlarged Regular Army, an
enlarged National Guard and the new National Army, thus bringing upon us
the problem of immediate supply with adequate reserves for an Army of
2,000,000 men; and these men were not to be stationed about in Army
posts, but mobilized into great camps under conditions which necessarily
increased the wear and tear upon clothing and equipment, and
correspondingly increased the reserves needed to keep up the supply. In
addition to this these troops were assembled for overseas use, and it
therefore became necessary to accumulate in France vast stores of
clothing and equipment in order to have the Army free from dependence,
by too narrow a margin, upon ocean transportation with its inevitable
delays. As a consequence the supply needs of the department were vastly
greater than the capacity of the industrial organization and facilities
normally devoted to their production, and the problem presented was to
divert workshops and factories from their peace-time output into the
intensive production of clothing and equipment for the Army. Due
consideration had to be given to the maintenance of the industrial
balance of the country. Industries already devoted to the manufacture of
supplies for the nations associated with us in the war had to be
conserved to that useful purpose. Perhaps some aid to the imagination
can be gotten from the fact that 2,000,000 men constitute about
one-fiftieth of the entire population of the United States. Supply
departments were, therefore, called upon to provide clothing, equipment,
and maintenance for about one-fiftieth of our entire people, and this in
articles of uniform and of standardized kinds. The great appropriations
made by Congress tell the story from the financial point of view. In
1917 the normal appropriation for the Quartermaster Department was
$186,305,000