Radio Speech of Senator Harry S. Truman at Washington, D.C.

RADIO SPEECH OF SENATOR HARRY S. TRUMAN OF MISSOURI ON THE WASHINGTON EVENING STAR'S RADIO FORUM ON MONDAY EVENING, MARCH 24, 1941, at 10:30 O'CLOCK TO BE RELEASED ON delivery. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN OF THE RADIO AUDIENCE:- This great country of ours is facing a great emergency, perhaps the most serious in its history. This condition was brought about by factors over which we had no control, and which we triod strenuously to avoid. The dictator countries have brought about a war in the Eastern Hemisphere which has an effect on every person and country on the globe, no mattor how remote they may be from the center of the conflict. To show how anxious we are to stay at peace, we enacted the Noutrality Act, voluntarily giving up some of our rights for which we had fought bloody battles. It became necessary for us to amend that Neutrolity Act in order to help the Denocracies maintain their indepondence, and finally to declare our- solves the Arsenal of Denocracy. as TRUMAN We suddenly decided in the Spring of 1940 that we wore totally un- APCHIVES "NATIONAL RECORDS AND prepared to face a world at war and bogan a frenzied attempt to remedy that Ess, CONTINUED ADMIN.' appalling situation. We decided to build a two-ocean Navy, and to train and arm a million men a year for a period of fivo yoars. We have bogun to spend money by the billions to accomplish those two purposes. We propose to give all- out aid to Great Britcin, Greece and China and are getting ready to spend more billions to do it, Our National Defonse machinery, nover adequate nor vory strong, has had to be suddenly expanded to enornous proportions, Contracts for construc- tion, for supplies and for munitions have been negotiated in desperate haste. Washington has been filled with people seeking contracts some sinceroly desiring to be of help to tho Government, others seeking to sorve only their own selfish interests. It has become necessary to let enormous contracts for oxpansion of airplane plants and for the construction of new ones, Munitions plants are being constructed throughout the Clothing, supplies, nunitions, battle- ships, airplanes, land and everything necessary for the defense program are