With these considerations in mind, the reader may make an interesting comparison of British and American plane production, the British figures being for both the British Army and the British Navy, whereas the American figures are for the American Army alone. In the following table of comparison the British figures are based on the Lockhart Report of November 1, 1918: _Comparative rate of airplane production--British and United States Army._ -------------------------+-----------+---------- | British | United Calendar year. | Army and | States | Navy. | Army. -------------------------+-----------+---------- 1915, Jan. 1 to Dec. 31 | 2,040 | 20 1916, Jan. 1 to Dec. 31 | 6,000 | [26]83 1917, Jan. 1 to Dec. 31 | 14,400 | [27]1,807 1918, Jan. 1 to Dec. 31 | 30,000 |[28]11,950 -------------------------+-----------+---------- [26] Experimental. [27] 1,476 built in last seven months only. [28] Inclusive of 135 secured by Engineering Department. American total 12,837 if October production had continued through November and December. Broadly stated, and without reference to types of planes produced, these figures mean that the United States in her second year of the war produced for the American Army alone almost as many airplanes as Great Britain in her third year of the war built for both her army and navy. In October, 1918, factories in this country turned out 1,651 planes, which, without allowing for the monthly expansion in the production, was at the rate of 20,000 planes per year. Assuming no increase in the October rate of production, we would have attained the 22,000 airplanes in 23 months after July 1, 1917, the date on which the production effort may be said to have started. Our production of fighting planes in the war period was 3,328. On the day the armistice was signed we had received from all sources 16,952 planes. Of these 5,198 had been produced for us by the allies. We had 48 flying fields, 20,568 Air Service officers, and 174,456 enlisted men and civilian personnel. These figures do not mean that we had more than 17,000 planes on hand at that time, because the mortality in airplanes is high from accidents and ordinary wear and tear. THE PROBLEM OF MATERIAL. Once we had started out on this enterprise we soon discovered that the production of airplanes was something more than a mere manufacturing job. With almost any other article we might have made our designs, given orders to the factories, and rested in the security that in due time the articles would be forthcoming. But with airplanes we had to create the industry; and this meant not only the equipping of factories, but the procurement and sometimes the actual production of the raw materials.