Industrialists in Olive Drab: The Emergency Operation of Private Industries During World War II

World War II was a war of production as well as of battles, campaigns, and strategies. As the United States Army faced its greatest challenge abroad in the form of the Axis military threat, soldiers and civilians on the American home front met an equally serious challenge: keeping the fighting men and the Allies supplied with the weapons, munitions, and other materiel needed to achieve victory. When vital war production was threatened by some of the most serious labor-management disputes in American history, the War Department intervened quickly and decisively, taking physical control of the affected industrial facilities and operating them under federal authority. Although the length and depth of that control varied with the severity of the dispute, the nature of the enterprise, and the importance of the industry to the war effort, the federal government was at least able to continue production without resorting, as in the past, to the use of armed force. This, then, is the story of a small group of individuals in the War Department who were charged with the mission of guaranteeing that private companies provided the military goods that had been promised. Initially prepared by the individual most closely involved with this effort, John H. Ohly, this history shows how combined military and civilian teams, well-schooled in law and in modern business management, financial, and arbitration practices, settled repeated disputes without significant delays in production or, when necessary, operated war plants in the name of the federal government, peacefully and efficiently. The development and implementation of procedures for the temporary but direct military supervision of private industries during World War II represented an innovation in the ever-growing role of the U.S. Army and the federal government in the production of war materiel. Although the work of Ohly and his compatriots was part of an expanding partnership of government and private industry, their experiences were in many ways unique. Grappling with difficult civil-military problems during a period of great national stress, they devised highly creative solutions B ones that still speak to us today and ones that will provide guidance in the future. For soldiers and civilians currently in the field of procurement, the following story thus has many lessons, not the least being the resolution of conflicting interests between the needs of the state and those of the private sector within the framework of our constitutional democracy.