People tend to forget about the Cash and Carry policy, which began shortly after Germany's invasion of Poland. FDR got around Congress' isolationist Neutrality Acts by making a case for supplying friendly nations with arms in a manner that would not end up with the U.S.A. getting dragged into the war (i.e. a reprise of 1917). As long as friendly nations paid up front and picked up American weapons in their own ships, the U.S. could help its friends and avoid a Lusitania incident whilst giving a country still in the grip of the Great Depression a much needed cash infusion.
Lend-Lease was put into place in early 1941 because the UK could no longer pay cash for American arms and it looked like the Nazis were close to winning the war in Europe.
So, the United States had already ramped up military production a couple of years prior to the start of Lend-Lease.
I disagree that the U.S. would dramatically increase military production for its own use once the Soviets and Chinese went to war. Yes, I think the Pentagon would probably ask for increased military spending for the sake of preparedness, and to aid the Chinese, but I think a lot of folks in Congress would be satisfied just to watch the world's two great Communist powers kicking the snot out of one another whilst adopting a wait-and-see attitude.
By the late 1980s, the U.S. had already skyrocketed the deficit and national debt on military spending. If the Cold War had continued a-la T2K v1.0, the U.S. would not have been able to sustain that level of military spending without prompting some sort of economic downturn or crisis. If you go with the v2.2 timeline, there would be some inertia there from the end of the Cold War. Military spending would already be down and it would take a while to build it up again. Either way, I see the U.S. as being late to the party when it comes to shifting to a wartime economy.
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