5/4/2023 0 Comments War production board![]() Freedom's Forge: How American Business Produced Victory in World War II, pp. industrial mobilization effort during World War II. His 1946 memoir Arsenal of Democracy is one of the major works on the U.S. He was replaced by Julius Albert Krug, who served from 1944 until the Board was dissolved. In February 1943, Roosevelt invited Bernard Baruch to replace Nelson as WPB head, but was persuaded to change his mind by advisor Harry Hopkins, and Nelson remained in the post. Patterson typically demanded that civilian needs be given lower priority because military supplies were essential to winning the war, and that argument usually prevailed. Stimson regularly criticized Nelson for his "inability to take charge". Described by historian Doris Kearns Goodwin as "habitually indecisive", Nelson had difficulty sorting the conflicting requests from various agencies. Nelson faced extensive criticism from the military during his tenure. Nelson proved a poor leader who feuded with the Army and failed to make timely decisions. In January, 1942, following America's entry into the war after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt abolished both the OPM and the SPAB, replacing them with a new agency, the War Production Board. Nelson, Executive Director, of SPAB after its first meeting As American war preparations continued to expand during 1941, new inefficiencies in the supply process were exposed, and in July a new agency, the Supply Priorities and Allocations Board (SPAB) was created to deal with them. ![]() With an eye to improving the efficiency of war production, in January, 1941 several agencies responsible for purchasing billions of dollars of war materials for the defense industry were reorganized into a central procurement agency, the Office of Production Management, with Nelson the director of priorities. In May 1940, Roosevelt appointed Nelson to a post at the Treasury Department where he served as acting director of the procurement division, managing sales of raw materials to Britain and its allies for use in their fight against the Axis.ĭuring the second half of 1940, Axis successes and the possibility of American involvement in the spreading war heightened concerns about the nation's military readiness. It was Nelson's experience at Sears, buying more than 135,000 different products while gaining an unparalleled knowledge of American industry, that led President Franklin Roosevelt to give him several jobs overseeing production of war material for the United States and its allies in World War II.
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