Oiling the War

In the sprawling, smelly Rumanian port of Constantsa last month, a tough gang of greasy longshoremen looked expectantly out to sea. Over five months had elapsed since Joseph Stalin agreed to send Russian oil to help Adolf Hitler win his war, and just about to come snailing into Constantsa at last was the first load of Soviet crude for the Nazis.

She was the Sakhaline, bung full with 70,000 barrels of crude from the Caucasus, and three more Soviet tankers tagged in her wake. Often before Constantsa dock hands had cheered the arrival of ships from the "Toilers' Fatherland," fraternized in waterfront dives with Soviet sailors. This reception of the Sakhaline was the warmest ever--but different. Shaking their fists, the longshoremen bellowed at the crew to haul down the Soviet flag. "Since Russia attacked Finland, the workers of Rumania know that 'Democracy' is used by the Soviets only as a catch word!" explained the longshoremen's leader. To avert a bloody brawl King Carol's police had to rush to the waterfront, arrested several dock workers.

Later, three more Soviet tankers arrived at Constantsa, and their cargo was unloaded and temporarily stored in tanks provided by the Rumanian Government. This was one way the Rumanians had of pacifying a German Government sorely irked by the lag in Rumanian oil deliveries. But nothing like enough tank cars were available in Constantsa last week to transport the oil on to Germany, and the fact that it was being stored brought out a major secret: Soviet sabotage has rendered almost useless the most direct rail line from Rumania to Germany, which runs for 191 miles through the part of Poland seized last year by Russia.

All other Polish tracks in Soviet hands have been converted to the wider Russian gauge. But Moscow agreed last Sept. 3 to leave the 191-mile Sniatyn-Przemysl line in standard European gauge. Over them were to have rolled five 60-car trains each day each way to haul goods between Germany and Rumania. But they were far behind schedule; as of Feb. 19, less than 700 cars had gone each way.

These figures New York Timesman Eugen Kovacs gleaned at a station on the Rumanian-Soviet frontier. Cars loaded with maize, oil cakes, apples, eggs, butter, meat and lumber for Germany are systematically broken open and plundered while crossing Soviet territory. The Germans have to send German freight cars, though they need them badly at home, because if they send cars they captured from the Poles the Russians seize these and claim they captured them. Investigator Kovacs added that the Nazis dare not send tank cars over this line, are "afraid that the oil will be kept in Russia." So they get oil from Rumania by a roundabout rail route through Hungary or up the Danube, now frozen. He was told that former Soviet Vice-Commissar of Foreign Affairs Vladimir Potemkin has said: "The help Germany will get from Russia is much smaller than the British or the Germans themselves think."

"Russian Gasoline." In Washington last week State Department officials, eager to find out the situation in the Soviet oil fields, conferred with three U. S. petroleum engineers who up to a few weeks ago were working in the Soviet Union at Ufa, Saratov and Grozni in the Caucasus.

Engineers Al Miller, O. N. Rassmussen and Hugh Rodman said that Russia today produces little gasoline of high octane rating (80 or more). Of the three Soviet refineries at which they worked, the engineers said that only Ufa may be able shortly to produce some real high-test gas, but they thought Saratov and Grozni will be much delayed in completion. Conditions in Soviet industry generally, as well as in the oil industry, they described as "bad," said this is due to shortage of engineers and the tendency of Soviet labor to drift endlessly from job to job. This is in violation of drastic Communist rules, but they found that crew after crew of raw workers has to be constantly trained for every specialized job because the men, after a few days, simply disappear.

The U. S. engineers told the State Department that conditions grew "much worse" in Russia as soon as the invasion of Finland began and nearly all trucks were requisitioned for the Army. So far as they could judge, Russia is not getting engineers from the Reich in important numbers yet.

"This Fascinating Oil Business" is a forthcoming book by Max W. Ball, onetime Chairman of the Oil Board of the U. S. Geological Survey,* in which figures on the European crude oil situation as it affects the war are arrestingly set forth. Expert Ball figures that, even if Germany should receive all Rumania's export oil not otherwise earmarked (18,000,000 barrels), the Reich must still get another 47,000,000 barrels annually from Russia in order to make up a total of 90,000,000 barrels which he figures is just enough to keep the Nazi war machine ticking over slowly as at present. Germany's normal peacetime consumption is 56,800,000 barrels. To wage active war, Expert Ball says the Fuehrer would need at least 142,000,000 barrels yearly. To find this looks almost hopeless to Expert Ball. The Soviets exported in 1938 only 6,600,000 barrels, and today their own war in Finland is gobbling their gas.

At the most, Germany may have oil reserves of 40,000,000 barrels. This would just about supply a short Blitzkrieg.

* To be published by Bobbs-Merrill Co. in April ($2.50).

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