Empty Tanks

U.S. generals and admirals scanned the news of strife and stress in the world and took a worried look at the armed forces' fuel tank. The tank was all but empty. The Army Air Forces were down to a 90-day supply. The Navy has less than half its operating needs. With the U.S. now using as much petroleum as the entire world consumed ten years ago, oil companies had scrambled for bigger shares of the civilian trade, and the services were being squeezed.

Last week Secretary of the Interior J. A. Krug summoned 50 bigwigs to Washington. He called on Navy Secretary James Forrestal, Secretary of War Kenneth C. Royall, Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz, and the Army Air Forces' Lieut. General Hoyt S. Vandenberg, to tell them of the fix the services were in.

The powwow got results. The industry agreed to set aside 5% of production for the armed forces, the estimated amount necessary to meet minimum needs. The oil will be taken out of the already tight civilian supply (5,100,000 bbls. daily against a demand of 5,700,000). To civilian users this meant that the anticipated winter shortage of fuel oil, and other fuels, would be that much worse. But the armed forces would not be operating on starvation rations.

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