War Production Board

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The War Production Board (WPB) was established in 1942 by executive order of Franklin D. Roosevelt. The purpose of the board was to regulate the production and allocation of materials and fuel during World War II in the United States. It rationed such things as gasoline, heating oil, metals, rubber, and plastics. It was dissolved shortly after the defeat of Japan in 1945.

1 Powers and responsibilities
2 Soviet penetration
3 Effects
4 See also
5 References

[edit] Powers and responsibilities

During World War II, the government needed to ensure that the armed forces and war industries received the resources for thier ever-growing need. The War Production Board (WPB) assumed that responsibility. The WPB decided which companies would convert from peacetime to wartime production and allocated raw materials to key industries. The WPB also organized nationwide drives to collect scrap iron, tin cans, paper, rags, and cooking fat for recycling into war goods. Across America, children scoured attics, cellars, garages, vacant lots, and back alleys looking for useful junk. During one five-month-long paper drive in Chicago, school children collected 36 million pounds of old paper, or about 65 pounds per child.

The heads of the War Production Board, Donald M. Nelson from 1942-1944 and Julias A. Krug from 1944 to 1945, had great and wide reaching control over the economic affairs of the United States. Over its three-year lifespan, the board supervised the manufacture of $185 billion worth of weapons and military supplies. It offered businesses lucrative contracts to switch over to war production, and large commercial farmers also had incentives for war production. Labor unions offered "no strike pledges" during the war, although few were kept, and taxes in general were raised, all in an effort to get the country prepared for war. New York investment banker Ferdinand Eberstadt was appointed chairman of the Army and Navy Munitions Board and vice chairman of the War Production Board. Eberstadt developed the organizational structure known as the "Controlled Materials Plan" that allowed the armed forces to prioritize their needs that in turn allowed the private sector to prioritize its production to meet the military's needs.

The War Production Board was quickly dissolved in November 1945, after the defeat of Japan. The Civilian Production Administration was set up in order to take over the reconstruction aspect that the WPB would have overseen.

[edit] Soviet penetration

Soviet intelligence penetrated the War Production Board, including several members of the Perlo group and its head Victor Perlo. The Moynihan Commission on Government Secrecy in 1995 referred to this as a serious attack on American security by the Soviet Union, with considerable assistance from an enemy within. The head of the Silvermaster group, Nathan Gregory Silvermaster also penetrated the agency. The following list are American citizens who were engaged in espionage activities on behalf of the Soviet Union while working for the War Production Board. Its code name as deciphered in the Venona project is the "Depot".

Edward Fitzgerald
Harold Glasser
Harry Magdoff, Chief of the Control Records Section of War Production Board and Office of Emergency Management
Victor Perlo, Chief of the Aviation Section of the War Production Board
William Remington
Greg Silvermaster

[edit] Effects

The WPB, along with other wartime committees which regulated spending and production, helped to reduce the potential for economic catastrophe after the close of World War II.

In 1943, the WPB hired Harvard Business School Professor Thomas North Whitehead to tour the nation and find out how Americans were reacting to rationing and controls. Whitehead reported that "the good temper and common sense of most people under restrictions and vexations was really impressive... My own observation is that most people are behaving like patriotic, loyal citizens."